She was getting better at holding her breath.
As people passed her, she sucked in air, held it, counted to 10, then released. Discouraged, she scrunched her eyes, nose, and lips together: she could still smell some people. A runner passed her on the walking path, shirtless, dripping with sweat, in the middle of an ethereal cloud of his own deodorant. She had held her breath for the recommended 10 seconds, and he was far past her when she finally inhaled, but there it was. A pretty yet manly combination of synthetic scents meant to mask his pungent body odor. Which would be worse? His actual odor, or this mix of sweat and menthol, with a hint of expired Brut cologne?
She could see people gathered at the basketball courts and at the outdoor workout area again. They were definitely not keeping with the six-feet requirement of social distancing.
A new story appeared that detailed a church choir that, in their devotion to their faith, had defied the social distancing rules and came together to practice their hymns for two and a half hours. God would protect them, they must have thought. They did sanitize their hands and didn’t hug or shake hands. But after two-and-a-half hours of lungs pumping air in and out, louder, softer, in harmony and in differing octaves, one singer, unbeknownst to his or her own self, had been spewing the infectious virus into the air, loaded with merciless particles who only had one mission in life- to reproduce in another victim’s body. Sixty parishioners attended the practice, forty-five were now infected, two souls were dead.
Man, that God of there’s was messed up she thought, a real asshole.
She sighed. It was just another example of people being crucified on the curve, cruelly exterminated by the new god- this new thing that in a span of a few months had the world on its knees, this thing brought people together (even though it was in fear of course), and who had conjured up more pointless prayers that ever before in recent history.
She needed to work on holding her breath.
As people passed her, she sucked in air, held it, counted to 10, then released. Discouraged, she scrunched her eyes, nose, and lips together: she could still smell some people. A runner passed her on the walking path, shirtless, dripping with sweat, in the middle of an ethereal cloud of his own deodorant. She had held her breath for the recommended 10 seconds, and he was far past her when she finally inhaled, but there it was. A pretty yet manly combination of synthetic scents meant to mask his pungent body odor. Which would be worse? His actual odor, or this mix of sweat and menthol, with a hint of expired Brut cologne?
She could see people gathered at the basketball courts and at the outdoor workout area again. They were definitely not keeping with the six-feet requirement of social distancing.
A new story appeared that detailed a church choir that, in their devotion to their faith, had defied the social distancing rules and came together to practice their hymns for two and a half hours. God would protect them, they must have thought. They did sanitize their hands and didn’t hug or shake hands. But after two-and-a-half hours of lungs pumping air in and out, louder, softer, in harmony and in differing octaves, one singer, unbeknownst to his or her own self, had been spewing the infectious virus into the air, loaded with merciless particles who only had one mission in life- to reproduce in another victim’s body. Sixty parishioners attended the practice, forty-five were now infected, two souls were dead.
Man, that God of there’s was messed up she thought, a real asshole.
She sighed. It was just another example of people being crucified on the curve, cruelly exterminated by the new god- this new thing that in a span of a few months had the world on its knees, this thing brought people together (even though it was in fear of course), and who had conjured up more pointless prayers that ever before in recent history.
She needed to work on holding her breath.
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