ensnared ovenbird I once thought I would die in my great grandmother’s bathroom. I was five. Sometimes my mother dragged me and my brother to her house. My mom would mow her lawn while Baba fed us cinnamon doughnuts from the freezer. She didn’t speak much English so she would mutter in Ukrainian. My name was stretched in her mouth and acquired a “ka” sound towards the end that sounded like dancing. One afternoon I went into her tiny bathroom. It was no bigger than a closet. I closed the door. It was the kind that locks when you depress the doorknob. I must have bumped into it, because when I was done I found I couldn’t get out. No amount of twisting and rattling released me. I panicked and my fear imprinted that bathroom onto my mind so that I can still see every detail to this day. I can recall the toilet with its pink fuzzy seat cover. I can recall the doll in a crocheted skirt that sat demurely atop the extra toilet paper roll. I can recall the wood panelled walls and the dim light and the feel of the shag rug beneath my feet. I screamed, and I could hear my mom on the other side of the door shouting instructions at me but I couldn’t find the trick of disengaging the lock. I’m not sure how long I struggled. Long enough that my mother was considering breaking the door off its hinges. But I finally pulled the knob towards me and stumbled out into the dining room, my face tear-streaked and horrified. Every once in a while this memory resurfaces. It’s deeply somatic. I might be sitting in my car at the grocery store or doing laundry or scanning a never-ending to-do list, and I’ll feel panic gathering like pigeons coming home to roost. I’ll suddenly see the inside of that fluffy pink bathroom and think: I’m still there. I’m still trapped. The room I’m imprisoned in is larger now so sometimes I forget that I can’t get out, but when I’m cooking yet another meal that my kids will hate I’ll occasionally see the walls closing in and I’ll turn to see the cruel smile on the face of that doll hiding Cottonelle under her skirt and I’ll feel a scream building in my chest, a scream that I swallow back down so I can ladle chicken and dumplings into bowls, set spoons on the table, and call everyone for dinner. 260120 what's it to you? who go blather from