The Smiling
Sometimes it is a complete and utter lie. Spenser can feel the corners of his mouth cracking like so many layers of old paint.
When did a smile become an act of resistance, a tiny rebellion of one?
You haven’t broken me yet. I’m still here. Keep piling on. I can take the weight. I’m not going away.
Cynicism will be the signal of his ultimate surrender, and he won’t let it get that far, won’t allow himself to feel trapped, won’t allow himself to be crushed and shaped into forms jaded, forms forlorn. He knows the look. Sees them all the time. Vocational doppelgangers. The tottering spine, the hollowed eyes, the flinty sadness etched on brow and cheek, the orphaned hairstyle — the bodily ruins of careers abandoned, catastrophically interrupted, pillaged, unsustainable.
Not him.
Now put your goddamn phone away and keep your head up so that you can see everyone see you grin and bear it.
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