3/17/14 Prompts

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“Chicago takes up about two hundred twenty-seven square miles,” says Zoe. “The land area of the planet is a little less than two hundred million square miles. The percentage is . .  . so small as to be negligible.”

She delivers the facts calmly, as if they mean nothing to her. But they hit me square in the stomach, and I feel squeezed, like something is crushing me into myself. So much space. I wonder what it’s like in the places beyond ours; I wonder how people live there.

I look out the window again, taking slow, deep breaths into a body too tense to move. And as I stare out at the land, I think that this, if nothing else, is compelling evidence for my parents’ God, that our world is so massive that it is completely out of our control, that we cannot possibly be as large as we feel.

So small as to be negligible.

It’s strange, but there’s something in that thought that makes me feel almost . .  . free.

Roth, Veronica (2013-10-22). Allegiant (Divergent Trilogy) (pp. 186-187). HarperCollins. Kindle Edition. 

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