no body

by Renuka Raghavan

On Thursdays, Chandra rents herself out as a shadow. People stand her against their walls and windows, the way you lean a ladder you never intend to climb. She learns their outlines quickly. A man with a chipped tooth wants his shadow longer than his body. A woman who smells of bleach wants no arms. They pay in coins warmed by pockets.

Chandra’s own shadow left years ago. It slid off her feet one afternoon and folded itself into a doorway, like it had an appointment she’d forgotten.

Today she’s hired by a boy who keeps all his apologies in a notebook. He opens it to show her, only the pages are all blank. He says sorry anyway, each time Chandra shifts her weight. His room is white as a confession. There’s one tiny window, but it looks painted on.

Stand there, he says, pointing to a corner that hums.

Chandra stands despite the light in the room feeling wrong, feeling too clean. It cuts her into pieces and reassembles her badly. On the wall, her shadow blooms, enormous. It has shoulders like cliffs, hands capable of holding weather, and a chest that rises for something that isn’t there.

The boy sits on the bed and stares. Does it hurt, he asks?

Chandra thinks of all the rooms she’s been leaned against. All the walls that remember her better than people do. Only when I move, she says.

They stay like that. The humming corner. The pretend window. The shadow breathing quietly, as if asleep but dreaming. When time loosens, the boy tears a page from his notebook and pins it over the shadow’s heart. The paper is blank, but the pin goes through anyway.

Chandra leaves with heavy pockets and heavier feet. Outside, dusk drags its violet sleeve across the sky. For a moment, her shadow walks beside her again. Then it stops.

Photo of Renuka Raghavan

BIO: A Pushcart Prize and Best Small Fictions nominee, Renuka Raghavan, writes short-form prose and poetry. She is the author of Out of the Blue (Big Table Publishing, 2017), The Face I Desire (Nixes Mate, 2019), and Nothing Resplendent Lives Here (Cervena Barva Press, 2022). For a complete list of her previous publications, visit her at: www.renukaraghavan.com