It’s April

After Winter by Chen Chen
In Memory of Maddi Kingsbury

This piece is an autofictional seed for the Autofiction x Worldbuilding submissions call. It inspired this other piece.

It’s April.

My mother remains inscrutable. My dad is alive. How it started and how it’s going.

It’s cold and ridiculous in Minnesota. A woman has been probably killed, probably by her partner, probably dumped in a probably field, probably with specks of salted emotion that hardened to probably ice between her eyelashes when he probably ejaculated, probably another one of us who could have been any of us, probably it’s all dumb fucking luck who gets strangled to completion by a man who probably seduced you.

I no longer live in Minnesota. My parents and friends continue to offer defense of what they call ‘the four seasons.’ I have come to know the sun. I have come to know no one else is doing dirt-crusted snow pies and windchill for funsies in April.

The Winona police department is calling for able-bodied volunteers with sturdy shoes to participate in the search effort.

It’s April. What does it mean to be alive?

It’s April and I am thinking about Madeline Kingsbury who is a real person and is probably frozen in the probably love story murder she probably wept through after dropping her children at daycare, probably never to dry their tears again. I am thinking about the way her neighbors will probably be quoted interchangeably in the media with the cornucopia of stories like hers when her probably murderer is arrested: “he seemed like a nice guy.” They “can’t believe something like that would happen here.” Probably improbably – probably forever. The United Nations says every 11 minutes a woman or girl is killed by someone in her own family. Cuckoo fucking scream romance Noah’s Ark international conspiracy nice guy imbecility.

In Minnesota big snowstorms happen every April but they are treated as aberrant and outrageous.

It’s April. A nervous breakdown is rescheduled for the following week. Death is postponed until further notice.

My husband called the freezer guy last week to come add Freon but our strawberry ice cream still undulates gazpacho. The outside of the container is contagious. Everything is sticky.

Madeline Kingsbury’s family has asked people to never search the Yucatan Wildlife Management Area alone. If you find something, please don’t touch it.