Mellie crept over to the fridge in the slow light of dawn. It was far too early to be awake. Or far too late, depending on how you looked at things. She poured herself a glass of chocolate oatmilk, then sipped it slowly as she microwaved some pancakes. Then she reached for the syrup.

The syrup.

Thhhhhheee syyyyyrruu

She blinked awake. The syrup!

Her fingers closed around the cool glass bottle, only to turn incorporeal as she pulled against gravity. The bottle slithered through her fingers. And it fell.

While it did not shatter, it bounced on impact, the cap flying away into the distance like her hopes and dreams. Rivers of viscous golden liquid flowed forth, pooling around her feet. Next to her, the microwave shrieked as she stared at the mess on the floor. Just like my life, she thought. The syrup, once a promise of a nice breakfast, now fought her valiant attempts at freedom. She tried to move, to pull herself free . . . but the more she struggled, the more the syrup stuck to her, until she was encased in a sticky pond of regrets. Too sweet now. She felt the syrup congealing around her, until she couldn’t move, could barely breathe, could barely think above the microwave screaming beside her. Surely, she would remain here until the end of her days, caught like a fly in amber in this dingy apartment with this stupid job. Maybe she would live into her 80s, but for what? The fly in amber would be the same to all who looked back on it. Running from death, perhaps, but dead nonetheless. Yet what were her options? The stickier the puddle, the deeper her dread, and soon her pancakes would be forlorn and cold. So with her pancakes, so with her heart. The microwave could only judge, only —

Boom.

Shatter.

Clash.

Mellie barely had time to scream as pieces of the exploded microwave rained down upon her. Blowing up, like my sanity, she thought faintly, before she lost consciousness.

***

“That’s a lot of blood.”

“Oh no. That’s a lot of blood.”

Oh dear, Mellie thought.

“Don’t worry, guys, it’s mostly syrup.”

Why is that almost worse? Her skin immediately itched, and she longed for nothing more than a shower. She’d been stuck for a lifetime, and she longed to be clean.

“How’s she doing?”

All she remembered was her syrup falling . . . her hopes and dreams . . .

“Is she alive?”

A jolt of memory. The microwave had exploded, hadn’t it? And with it her pain. In its place was the split-second of clarity as the shrapnel was raining down. I’m not going to die today. She’d live to watch ducks in the park again, and watch the sun set on the lake. She’d fill the empty syrup bottle with homemade salad dressing. Sometimes you have to lose something, she thought, to let something better fill its place. As the syrup seeped into the hospital sheets, she felt her heart restarting. Somewhere, a piece of amber shattered, and a fly reopened their wings.

A smile, and then, “She’s breathing.”

“I’ve always wanted an air fryer,” she mumbled, and squinted into the blinding light.

And so in the hospital, on the day her syrup fell, came the words she’d yearned for: “Welcome home, Mellie. We’re so glad to have you back.”