"Long Division" by Jennifer Handy

The year that I turned ten,

I discovered that division

and divorce

are not so very far apart

not only in the dictionary,

but also in their meaning.

It was the year our household

split in two,

divided by an integer,

which should have been

a simple problem.

The eight place settings

of dishes and silverware

were divided easily

into sets of four.

The chintz sofa and loveseat

were separated,

the matching ottoman

fought over

with a vehemence

that left a scar.

Then there was me,

a little girl,

which meant, as I soon discovered,

that I was not a full-fledged person,

being underage,

and not an integer

but something more like a fraction.

Curious things can happen

when you throw fractions

into an equation,

and what is technically division

can start to look

more like multiplication.

Suddenly, I had two homes,

two beds, two bedrooms,

two dogs,

two Christmases,

two birthdays.

And as with any long division,

you almost always have to carry.

The books, the clothes, the homework,

and later the lipstick and mascara.

If you forget to carry over

the things

of your existence,

something’s always off.

Your answer’s never right.

The twos come back to haunt you.

You have two rooms to clean,

two different sets of chores,

two sets of rules to follow.

In high school,

there were two curfews,

two different policies on boys.

Then came college,

at which point things all went to three.

When I moved out on my own,

I went back down to one,

but now I’m thoroughly confused.

Divide by one,

and you end up with the amount

you started with.

But what happens when you

were never a whole number

to begin with?

Jennifer Handy is the author of the chapbooks California Burning (Bottlecap Press, 2024) and Dirt (Finishing Line Press, 2025).