In my middle school health class, they told me that the human heart is roughly the size of a fist. I don't remember what the teacher said next, because I was too busy curling my fingers into my palm. Surely, whatever I was feeling had to have been made by something larger than my frail hands; something more powerful than my thirteen-year-old fist. I closed my eyes and punched the desk as hard as I could, the skin on my knuckles tore open, blood surfacing, shooting pain up my arm, and I walked with teary eyes to the principal's office, when he asked why I did it, I could only say I was testing my heart. These days, I still ball my hand into a fist and just stare at it for a bit. I do this everyday, and sometimes I'll punch something, like my desk, or a wall, or the drawer that holds all the letters she wrote me. My fist has gotten a little larger since then, but it still breaks and bleeds just the same.
