by Meg Pokrass

We’re in the Tunnel of Love when my sister says she is stuck there. She’s in the front seat of the boat with my father, who keeps yelling about how he has always only wished for the best for us girls.  

“This Tunnel of Love falls to shit,” she says, grabbing me by an elbow.

The last time she was in the tunnel she came out with a child, a daughter she didn’t know what to do with.

“What are we going to do if I have another?” she says, but I’m pissed.

“Let’s just try and have a good time,” I say.

Our boat is sinking since Mom drove away, and our father isn’t strong enough to jump in the water alone.

And then I realize that this is another daydream. I’m not in the Tunnel of Love, in fact, I’m sitting in my car on the highway, pressing the horn, trying to get through to the exit.

I’m breathing hard and there is no love on the highway and my sister ended her life last Xmas.

I drive to my father’s house where he sits in the living room waiting. When he opens the door, he says, “Feeling lucky?”

Rooms in Vegas at Xmas are nearly free as nobody wants to be there. I can work up a smile.  We stay in the Mars Hotel and we gamble and we do our best not to think about Christmas. At the blackjack table, we win with a flush of hearts.