Inside This Gilded Cage
an excerpt

“You’re confusing me,” was all I heard Lester say. I did not know who he was talking to or what he was talking about.
“Who’s confusing you?” I said, feeling my eyebrows lay on my nose.
“My fingernails.” I could not imagine how fingernails could confuse him. I even said this aloud to him. “Well, look at them. They are just there. What, exactly, is their purpose?”
“You know,” Tristan started, staring down at his own hand, “I’ve lived with my fingernails all my life and I’ve never really understood them.”
“I’m sure they feel terribly underrated and misunderstood,” Charlie added.
“My pants confuse me.” I looked at Everett strangely. “What? They do. Yesterday, they fit just fine. Today, they are too big.”
“That’s because they’re mine, you dolt,” I said.
“Oh.”
“But, still, that can be very confusing,” Charlie agreed.
“If they confuse you so, go put on a pair of yours.”
“Has anyone ever had a conversation like this?”
“Probably not. And let’s hope that no one ever will again.”
“Do you think anyone else in the world has ever sat around and thought, ‘My fingernails are terribly misunderstood and my pants confuse me’?” He was met with silence all around. He tilted his head back again. “We’ve reached a whole new level of idiocy.”
“Indeed,” we knocked our forks together in agreement.