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Olive Olivia Olive Olive
With the baby came trouble, but not any of the kind the mommy blogs warned Ana about.
Ana hovered over the grill in her white jersey shorts and yellow bikini top, hair up in a sweaty bun. In one hand, she clicked metal tongs. Corn cobs and discs of eggplant browned and crackled on the grill. Crooked in her left arm hung her daughter Olive, head on Ana’s shoulder, fat sticky baby hand sprawled on Ana’s tit. All through her pregnancy, she never stopped wearing bikinis, high heels, crop tops, showed up to pool parties and the beach with her big belly hanging over tiny bottoms, her swollen tits on full display. Her wife Jules thought she looked hot pregnant, and it made Ana feel hot. She liked being wanted by her. She liked the idea of being the two hot dyke moms in the neighborhood. She liked being a family with Jules.
—was
wished
mommy brain
Why were other people always reaching for her baby before she could even answer them?
“I think my mother’s haunting us, and I think she’s doing it through our kid.”
You’re crazy.
Kayla Kumari Upadhyaya is a lesbian writer of essays, fiction, and pop culture criticism. She is an upcoming fellow for Lambda Literary's Writer's Retreat for Emerging LGBTQ Voices. Her work appears or is forthcoming in McSweeney's Quarterly Concern, The Cut, Vice, Autostraddle, and Catapult.
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