Pins and Needles

This place has become her Iron Chair. Her inhibitions snag on the spikes.

She stays put.

She sits still.

Each day, she abides by her reluctant lifestyle. She stares down at plastic meals. Blank magazines. Thousand-pound shoes. She locks her tongue and chokes quietly on the keys. The blood-dotted patterns that freckle her flesh never quite fade away before being pierced afresh by another morning. She bleeds faster than she heals. She's draining and somehow not dying.

Still, she follows the rules. Her rules.

She remains sedentary.

She avoids every door.

She endures the perpetual state of restless leg syndrome.

She behaves.

If she quirms, the needlepoints only dig further.