Blood pools above his lip, spills down to his chin, drips onto the shark eating pizza on his pajamas. I hold his sticky hand, lead him to the washroom, sidestep shiny pools of crimson on the floor. Pinch your nose, I tell him. He’s half crying, half giggling as I wipe his hands and face, as I remove his bloody clothes. The iron scent sends my mind skipping backward 30 years, back to a Care Bears pillowcase soaked red at 3 a.m. I’m giggling now, too, because look at all this blood, look at all this blood and we are OK.
Andrea Lynn Koohi is a writer and editor from Toronto, Canada. Her recent work appears or is forthcoming in Pithead Chapel, The Maine Review, Idle Ink, Streetlight Magazine, The Cabinet of Heed, Cypress Press, and others. Find Andrea on Twitter @AndreaKoohi.