Grey, tight car leather,
Plastered to the backs of my sweat-wet thighs.
I lift a leg.
I bare my teeth as I hear my epidermis peel away.
Ouch.

Tongue out for the millionth time I try to taste the air,
Upper lip beading with sweat,
Cheap, shady plastic of my thick sunglasses bending the slow-cooking world around me.

The heat wiggles like soggy snakes,
I pin the heavy head of hair I was born with up again,
Careful to avoid touching anything in fear of burning myself,
Letting the warm, colored plastic of my jaw clip take a mouthful of hair into its angler-fish-like teeth.

Tongue out.
Hair up.
Lift other leg.
Ouch.

It’s too hot to listen to music,
Our brains too fried with heat to hear the offending tones of whatever’s on.
Tongue out.
Elbow bumps metal car handle.
Yelp with the burn.

Moaning I lean back.
I hate the new car smell,
The strong, heady waft of leather like an anvil on my cerebellum.
The water’s lukewarm, but my tongue’s to wet to taste anything anyway.
The sky’s blue. The sun’s glaring death upon the golden hills of brittle tallgrass,
And the Earth is like a sauna.

How much longer?
I wipe the sweat away.
Pin up hair.
Lift other other leg.
OUCH.