Lizz Dawson is a writer, poet, and creative writing professor from York, PA. She holds an MFA in creative nonfiction from The New School and recently attended Sewanee Writers Conference. You can find their work at Bending Genres, Hayden’s Ferry Review, The Rumpus, and Peatsmoke Journal, where her nonfiction essay was nominated for Best of the Net. Lizz is currently working on two memoirs and writes a Substack titled Hangry Ghost. You can find her IRL laying in the sun or online at @lizzdawson.
Probably, then and there on the wraparound porch, I should have known to turn around, should have left it all to someone else—the missing key an omen. But I was always going to find it.