“Brake before the curve,” her mother always told her in mountainous terrain.

Senior year, she met him in philosophy class, slept with him when he mentioned love.

“We’re too young to get serious,” he said one night. Permanent goodbye.

Spring semester, he was engaged.

His words were code. Broke her.

C.G. Thompson has two stories in the recently released TL;DR Press’ Women’s Anthology: Carrying Fire. Other stories and poems have appeared in Yalobusha Review, Prime Number Magazine, Fictive Dream, Jersey Devil Press, and Redheaded Stepchild, among others.