The Girls.

My dad left me the girls when I was twelve. Marlo was my favorite, but I sortof liked Jackie too, when she wasn’t doing coke.

It should have tipped me off to something, anything, that I was smarter than all of them. I had kept books for my father since I was old enough to read and analyze. So when his life was threatened, he knew he could trust me to run the business better than anyone. Better than Kaybo, better than P. Dope, or even Wilson who was successfully running three of his own and knew every in and every out of turning profit.

I knew the girls wouldn’t cheat me. I was Wes Hilden’s daughter. Wes Hilden, who held an inexplicable power over them, even from the grave. They took clients, usually an average of three a night, dropped off their earnings to me and passed out. They were all highly trained and highly broken. This was my father’s legacy.

“So you need me to pick you up anything, Jenny?” asked Marlo, sifting through last weeks Cosmo. She was draped over the leather armchair, her legs freshly shaven and glowing in the soft lighting.

“No thanks,” I said, going over my calculations for the third time, my eyes hungry for any misplaced number.

Marlo sighed and ran a hand through her lovely, wavy hair.

“Well,” she started, sitting up, “Is it me or Polly who has runner duty tonight, I forget,” she bit her knuckle, smiling and chuckled like that was the most amusing thing she could have said.

“Polly. You can have the night off if you want it. I mean, you’d only be available for the late late shift right?” I asked, assessing her with my darkest, brown eyed glance before returning to my numbers.

“Right.”

I nodded and kept working, setting last night’s spreadsheet aside and reaching for a brand new one. My father had never looked like he’d poured over a thing in his life, as in a nose-to-the-grindstone, this-is-my-livelihood kind of way, but I was constantly busy. Maybe I attributed it to his built-up glory, he was Wes Hilden, he didn’t work he owned. And sometimes, he owned you.

She was watching me, Marlo. It was something she did all the time and it never ceased to make me uncomfortable. I always detected the faintest aftertaste of dominance. She was so much older, almost twice my age. I fought the thought that was clawing its way around the foggy recesses of my brain. I did know what I was doing here. I always knew what I was doing. This was my inheritance. I was in control.

“You know,” she says, when I haven’t glanced back at her for a full minute, “I don’t know if you know this or not, but some of the other pimps in the area are getting suspicious. Wondering who the great Hilden left his empire to.”

I stopped scrawling. “How do you know that?” I asked.

She shrugged haughtily, “I get around, Jenny.”

“How suspicious are they getting Marlo?” She wanted my attention, she had it. I needed to know if she was bluffing.

She recoiled slightly, flipped her hair, and addressed me once more. “Not very. But I wouldn’t get too comfortable.”

She stood, on her way out. Before she’d crossed the threshold, she turned back slightly. I was watching as she left.

“Now are you sure you don’t want me to pick you up anything, Jenny?”

I smiled a tiny, little smile. “Maybe a new package of printer paper.”

Mauve. (3)

When I couldn’t stay in the bathroom any longer I grudgingly returned. I found it surprisingly sparse and realized that almost the entire crowd had migrated into the adjacent room for a tribute video and circulating hor’dourves.

            A young couple stood in the corner, ignoring me, and a group of old ladies shot me glances that painstakingly reminded me of high school.

            Fed up, I uncrossed my arms and walked across the room as confidently as I could. Apparently, it wasn’t such a huge success because I almost collided with the open casket trying to pull up my strapless bra.

            “Holy shit!” I muttered to myself, covering my heart as I just stopped myself short of toppling onto Trish Hurley’s worm-food grandfather. 

            As my heart returned to it’s normal pace, I found myself staring at the old  guy. He looked like he had been a nice guy, with tufts of shockingly white hair around the back of his head and deep laugh lines creasing his temples. His was the first friendly face I’d seen in an hour, the first face to hint to me that my idea to fashion a more modest dress out of toilet paper was the crazy notion that it was.

I found myself wondering about his life, he didn’t look like the type of guy to dump the love of his life because of a stupid misunderstanding.

            “Are you gonna cry? Because if you are you could use the toilet paper on your shoes to dry the tears,” said someone in a messy British accent about two centimeters away from my eardrum, sending me into my second mini panic attack within ten minutes.

            I turned quickly to see a guy in a dark green oxford, clutching a flask and staring at me. I looked down at my shoes and sure enough there was a trail of cotton squares attached to it like a train. I scuffed the floor furiously to dislodge it from my stiletto heel.

            “Might I ask, how did you know old chap Edgar here?” he asks, his breath searingly alcoholic.

            I stutter for a second, wondering who the hell this guy is and why he’s talking to me. “I didn’t,” I finally say.

            “Well that’s a bit odd, were you his hooker at least?” He smiles as if he’s said something dreadfully funny.

            I feel an indignant look of contempt contort my features, but after a second I let it fall away and wished I were anywhere in the world but in that funeral home.

            “No.”

            “I’m sorry, love,” he says, his eyes sparkling, he sways a bit, “But I’m afraid I’ve had one too many slugs of this stuff.” He holds up his flask and takes a sip, I hear the glug glug of the liquid as it scrambles to wherever gravity leads it.

            I lean my head back and feel a startlingly powerful wave of self-pity. “Why are you talking to me?” I ask, wishing he would go away.

            “Quite honestly it’s because you’re cute,” he says casually, smiling, “However, I hate the dress.”

            Bold. Flattering. But unnecessary.

            “Hey, you got enough of that stuff to share?” I ask him, motioning toward his flask.

            “Mi cerveza es su cerveza,” he says, sounding convincingly Mexican.

            “That’s beer?”

            “Nope.”

            He’s smiling still, like he’s just the funniest guy in the whole damn world.

            I grab it from him, fed up, and he follows me out the door. 

An Unseen Arena.

This was my entry for an online short story contest. What do you think?

I twist my hair into a ponytail, tucking it under my cap and lowering the brim. Then I take a final look around the room full of strangers wondering which of them would help me escape and which would try to kill me.
 “Lillian, why do you wear that silly cap?” asks Lita, stepping in the room and pulling the chart off the bed. She makes a few marks and slides it under her arm, ready to move. They prep my bed for removal. The pops and clicks echo through me, building layers of necessary armor.
 “I’m not letting them take my hair,” I say.
 Lita smiles at me, her eyes sad but dancing. She takes her cool hand and rests it on my cheek for a split second. It gives me a little more strength because she knows I’m going to battle in an arena I can’t see. 
 Lita was the nurse with the gold nail polish.  A little Spanish woman from the Bronx, she was the one they called in when I showed signs of ‘mental distress.’
 “No you listen here, child,” she’d said, leaning over me, eyes locked with mine, “It’s just something you’ve gotta go through. You see a lot of things as a nurse, and I’m telling you, you’ve got it good.” Her hands had felt like gloss from overmoisterizing, she put them on mine and squeezed tightly. “Stay strong and you’ll live. Fight, and you’ll prosper.”
 I held onto her words like a holy mantra.
I’m a prisoner, and my body is my jail.
 The second cracks apart, Lita’s hand is gone. The bed is moving and I can’t help but start fidgeting, rattling my bones as if to say ‘wake up boys, you’ve got a job to do.’
 The hallway is an ambient silence of rubber medical shoes and humming machines.  I fold my arms and scrunch my eyes when we reach its openness, binding myself up in my eyelids, crossed limbs, wool cap, and lucky pink windbreaker with five dollars in the pocket.
 We pass the waiting room where shouts stir the stagnant air.  In my rigid state of isolation I remember my parents fighting last some time spring. Some inflammatory bill was clutched between my father’s ruddy hands, his face hardening like ice in trays.
 My mother screamed things like “It wasn’t me! It wasn’t me!” breaking already because she’s made of paper.
  I remember them then hugging, my mom crying, her eyes turning into bluish, milky saucers. That sadness turned into day-long phone calls, shouting at banks and credit card companies and my mother’s bare arms pulling me close when she couldn’t handle the world any longer. She cried into my hair as the city midnight tumbled in from the four by four window.
 “Some people are just no good, darling,” she muttered into the crown of my head. “They’ll cut you down, kill you. Especially when you’re at your most vulnerable. They won’t lose a wink of sleep either. I can’t fight it Lil, I can’t keep fighting it. There are just too many.”
 She kissed me and cried as I fell asleep in her arms, dreaming about sickening moments like this one, only not so real.
A minute slides us up the elevator and out of corner of my eye Trace the transport guy wheels me through the heavy, metal doors. Three doctors walk by his side, two of which never smile.
 Those are the kind with shots and gas masks, inoculations and injections. They’re always sticking needles where they don’t belong. They’re the ones to watch out for.
 It’s only about half a minute later that I feel a whisper work its way through my ear canal. “Lillian, we’re coming to the room,” Lita tells me, just like I had asked her to.
 “Stop!” I yell, my voice carrying louder and further than anyone thought it could. I hoist myself up into a sitting position, slowly.
 Trace is bewildered, but he slows the gurney and gently, it stops.
 “Why are we stopping?” asks one of those tight-lipped doctors to my right.
 “Shh, let her take a minute,” says Lita with undertones of her lilting Spanish accent.
 They’re not important anymore as I stare down that faded white lettering adjacent to the doorway. It spells out ‘Oncology 4-106’ on a little green panel underlined in Braille.
They aren’t the enemy, those white and careful, Times New Roman figures, but I pretend they are. I need something tactile to size up and stare down, my real captor never shows its face.
 I hear a distinct ringing in my ears as I prepare myself. I imagine that some various battlecries sing out through my pores and coat everything in a tremulous based courage.
They’ll cut you down, kill you. Especially when you’re at your most vulnerable.
Stay strong and you’ll live. Fight, and you’ll prosper.
I bunch up the starchy sheets in my fists.
 “Okay,” I say. “Let’s go.”
 Trace slowly wheels me onto the battlefield, because I’m not too good with walking anymore.
**
 It’s the oldest doctor that is to insert the IV. I can’t trust him, but I don’t protest as he starts prepping the chemo. I lock eyes with Lita. Her strong and committed presence is the only thing keeping me sane.
 “You ready?” asks the doctor, I slide my eyes over his name embroidery. Doctor Robert Rail.
 “Yes, Dr. Rail.”
 Another needle spears through my barriers and both fronts charge. Their collision resounds in my every bone.
**
When I finally lose track of the hours, it’s over.
My mother comes in then. She’s off from work and I can tell she’s had a hard day by the way her lipstick smudges in the corners.
“Hi baby,” she smiles at me, frail as ever.
I’m feeling too weak to talk, but I wrap a finger around hers, needing her.
A minute passes, pregnant and silent.
“Why, it’s pretty warm in here, isn’t it?” asks my mother, pulling at her scoop neck.
“Now, I know you’ve got to be burning up in that wool cap, Lillian.” She reaches out for the brim.
I barely have time to choke out a scratchy “No!” before she peels it off, leaving gravity to pull half of my beautiful curls to flutter into the sheets in a shower of brunette, dead. 

Thirty-Five.

Thirty-five years. Thirty-five years and there’s finally a bouquet in my hands, a garter on my thigh. I have not settled like my sister says, she doesn’t recognize the unique relationship Bill and I have.

She doesn’t realize that we’re silent because he’s tired, because I’m chewing. Or that I like the way he works ‘til dawn, it means that he’s committed to something. She doesn’t understand that we don’t believe in PDA.

I’m finally married. I’ve got that ring, that walk to remember, a reason to procreate responsibly.

                We’re finally standing here together, staring into some overly-scruffy man’s Nikon. He goes to reload the film and Bill’s hand leaves my waist. He looks away and runs a hand through his hair, thinking. I steal a glance to check if my train is mud free. The only thing I hear is the click of the film dropping into the camera. I try to remember that my sister is wrong and that I’m thirty-five.

Breaking With Her.

Take this in slowly.

The scrawling of his pen was the only noise to fill up the room. The sun hung its four o’clock angle to send lazy beams through the high, cathedral windows. They illuminated the legions of dust particles all the money in the world couldn’t eradicate.

George Ames was curled over his grand, mahogany desk at the head of the classroom, grading. Every so often he’d glance up long enough to take a sip of coffee, stare out at the rows of empty desks, and marvel at the fact that only one year of teaching had brought him here. He sighed at those perfect lines and took a gulp from his crested, green mug, incredulous.

From the doorway, Mary Catherine Moor stood; leaning against the doorframe and watching him sigh and cross out incorrect answers on the final exams. Here in this doorway, it was like time stood still. If she just stood here and pressed her body against the mahogany, watching Mr. Ames fix all those mistakes, she could maybe pretend that it wasn’t only a matter of time before she was walking home and removing that green plaid skirt and crested blazer for the last time.

The sound of advancing stilettos on the marble hallway jostled her back into the present moment and forced her hand to rap thrice against the wood.

George looked up from his papers. “Mary Catherine,” he said, standing.

They made eye contact and she offered him a small, pained smile.

“Please come in,” he gestured her into the room, smoothed his hair back, and returned to his seat.

Mary Catherine obeyed his request and maneuvered herself into the desk directly in front of his, her long, blond hair spilling around her like a curtain.

George cleared his throat. “Do you want to talk about something?” he asked, shaking his red pen between his pointer and middle finger, nervously.

He watched as her pretty little face rearranged itself into an expression eons more mature than her thirteen years.

“I just… I wanted to tell you something,” she broke her gaze to glance at the ground, “I won’t be coming back next year to Seckert Prep.” Her voice was lower than it probably should have been and it carried the faintest twinge of laryngitis

It was a few seconds before he spoke.

“Are you moving?” he asked, for lack of a better response.

She shook her head and inhaled.

“Well, is it the money? Because you know, there are scholarships.”

“No. It’s not the money. Not in so many words.” It sounded like something in her was breaking.

She drug her eyes slowly across his facial features slowly as they sat in silence.

“Does this have to do with your stepfath-“

“Don’t talk about him,” she said forcefully, sitting up straighter and crossing her arms on the desk.

“But if he-“

“Please. Don’t,” her voice was still quietly severe like he knew it could be.

His body softly recoiled. “Okay.”

Mary Catherine leaned back into the chair and tilted her head to the ceiling, feeling comfortably melancholic, wishing she could stay here in this desk, across from this man, forever.

“I’m going to miss it here so much,” she said, turning her face back to his, her dark eyes brimming with a subtly unabashed confidence.

He nodded and looked at her feet, covered in knee socks and picturesque Mary Janes.

“And I’m going to miss you. You’re my favorite teacher, Mr. Ames.”

“It will be a marked loss not to have you in my class next year,” he said, matching her steady and direct gaze.

She was easily the smartest in her entire class, probably the ones above her as well. It wasn’t that she got the highest marks, but she held a wisdom and maturity behind those large brown eyes that far exceeded that of her peers’. God, was she smart.

“It’s just been hard, dealing with it all,” she said.

George laid his hands out flat on the cool surface before him, feeling invested to the point that if she broke, his heart would break with her.

“You know, Mary Catherine, I can’t pretend to know what you’re going through,” he said leaning forward onto his elbows. She could smell the sophisticated musk of his cologne that clung to his sport coat.

“But I am always here for you. Remember that.”

She nodded and drug a hand through her smooth, blond locks.

“Thank you,” she said, her voice raw and low in intonation.

They sat in silence for another full minute, attempting to delay the inevitable.

There was a knocking at the door. “George?”

He turned to see Mrs. Ryden, the assistant principal, over coiffed and holding a stack of papers.

“Yes Mrs. Ryden?” he asked in his most impressive teacher’s voice.

“I don’t mean to interrupt,” she said, glancing at Mary Catherine, “I just wanted to remind you, George that final grades need to be posted and mailed by Tuesday.”

He nodded, “I’m aware. Thank you Mrs. Ryden.”

They listened to her footsteps as she slowly walked out of earshot.

“I guess I should go,” said Mary Catherine, not yet moving to leave.

“I’m glad you came to tell me,” he said.

She grudgingly stood and took the few meandering steps across the room.

She stopped in the doorway once more, running her fingers along the brass doorknob.

“I’m glad to have known you,” she said in the most heartbreaking tone possible.

He felt his throat catch as he released the word ‘likewise’ into the dusty, sunstreaked air.

In another second, she turned and left, leaving behind her a hollow wake of stagnant air and the color of mahogany.

Crazy: Part Two.

She wears the kind of black dress that both a mother and a date would approve of. Something ruffled but tight that reflects moonlight subtly.  

                “Lexa,” he says, spotting her blond waves littered with casual braids.

                She turns and has a light purple wildflower twisted between her pointer and middle finger.

                “Brought this for you,” she says, “I just found it growing out by the beach, and it… reminded me of you.”

                “This purple wildflower?” he asks.

                She nods and her small smile shows the glitter glinting off her cheekbones.

                “I love it,” he says taking it from her and starts to put it in his pocket.                     

                “No,” she says, taking it from his hand and twisting the stem around his ear.

                “Two?” asks an overly chipper waitress looking hopelessly white under the Mexican pattern of her uniform.

                “Yes.”

                “Right this way.” She starts leading them out into the pier side restaurant, illuminated only by festive-colored candlelight dancing along the wood planks.

                “Is this satisfactory?” she asks, forcefully cheerful and barely older than the two of them.

                “Yes, thank you,” says Lexa, watching the blackening waves swirl beneath them.

&&&

                “I’ve really been into art lately, and poetry. Something about the poetic way of thinking makes life worth living, you know?” she says.

                “Exactly. As in merging theory and artistry as opposed to never questioning the daily grind? That’s what kills me about society.”

                “Oh God, please don’t tell me that you’re the kind of person who goes on rampages about society. Hellbent and hypocritical, party of one.”

                “No, no. No rampage, but can’t a man have a pinprick of contempt for the current generational standards? Hello, it’s been called the death of intellectualism.”

                “Okay, you’ve got me there. I’ve always had intellectualism close to my heart; no way do I want to see it buried.”

                “Glad you understand.”

                “However, one could make a case that it’s not simply society causing such a death.”

                “Well I’m sure there are other contributing factors. But isn’t society alone just an smorgasbord of abstract contributing factors?”

                “Maybe yes and maybe no.”

                “How so?”

                “Society doesn’t encompass all aspects of life, does it? In fact …”

&&&

                “I don’t know, maybe translator or marketing director. My Dad’s pushing for engineer. But I’ve always sort of had this dream of being a writer,” he says.

                “A writer? Seriously? Are you writing currently?”

                “I’ve been working on a few pieces.”

                “Wow, that’s exciting. What about?”

                “Oh, I don’t know. Life, I guess. Most of my stuff has to do with life. I’m kind of proud of my most recent piece, I mean it’s no Great Gatsby or anything…”

                “I don’t understand why it couldn’t be.”

                “Are you being serious? Or is that wrinkled brow meant to set up an oncoming guffaw?”

                “I am serious. F Scott Fitzgerald was just a man with thoughts. You’re just a man with thoughts. Just because he’s dead and immortalized in print doesn’t mean he’s God or anything.”

&&&

                “That’s completely irrelevant!” he cried.

                “It is not completely irrelevant! Childhood is the sole factor that molds you for the rest of your life. Hello, look around you!”

                “Not true! Not if one can overcome it, it takes a lot of strength and greatness to do, but of course it can be done. The world had high expectations, he turned out not to have that strength and greatness, and therefore deserves none of my sympathy or respect.”

                “But that blatantly disregards psychology!”

                “To hell with psychology!”

&&&

                “You’re perfect.               “

                She’s silent for the first time all night, crossing her arms in an x over her torso and looking off at the water.

                “Lexa?”

                “I’m not perfect,” she says forcefully with a real intensity that had been absent from their previous argument.

                Carl smiles and drums his fingers on the table. It’s been at least an hour since their plates were cleared but he feels like maybe six minutes have passed. However, his vocal chords tell a different story.

                “You know,” he starts, “When I saw you for the first time, on the pier today. I just, I just knew. I just knew that you were perfect and that we’d be perfect together. This relationship is just, it’s… kind of flawless, don’t you think so?”

                “Don’t say that,” the dewy sparkles along her cheekbones are shining in the candlelight.

                “Don’t be self deprecating.”

                “It’s not self deprecation. It’s honesty. Nobody’s perfect, especially me.”

                “Perfection is in the eye of the beholder.”

                She’s quiet. Stuck between truth and better judgment.

                “Let’s go, I want to show you something,” she says.

                “Okay but we still have to pay. Should I take care of it, or are you the kind of feminist who likes to go fifty fifty?” he asks, thumbing through his wallet, realizing he’ll probably have to skimp on the tip.

                “I got it,” says Lexa, slapping down a single bill that covers the expenses and then some.

                “No, Lexa. Come on.”

                “Trust me my parents are loaded. It’s no problem. You keep your Pizza Hut money.”

                “You left her a fifty percent tip.”

                “Yeah, well she was a great waitress, despite being the palest Mexican I have ever seen,” she simpers and turns to walk out.

                “You’re perfect!”

                “Shut up!”

&&&

                “I’m sorry, but why did we have to take your car?” Carl asks, watching a beach bonfire grow dimmer and dimmer in the rearview mirror.

                “Because I am not telling you where we’re going, first off. And secondly your car was probably made when Eisenhower was president, and I am not waiting for a tow truck on the side of the road. That is just not happening.”

                “Okay, I choose to ignore that heinous swipe at poor Tina. But may I also point out that you are going to have to drive me all the way back to the restaurant after this secret, sketchy event, just creating more work. I could have followed you.”

                She cocks her head like she did this morning and runs a hand through her hair, never taking her eyes off the winding beach road.

                “I’ve got enough gas. So for now just be quiet and get high on some Nirvana,” she says, jamming her hand into the on button of her CD player.

&&&

                “Oh my god, Lexa. What are we doing here?!” Carl says, walking only a step behind her and keeping all limbs close and rigid.

                She doesn’t respond for about thirty more seconds of walking before she turns around and lightly touches her fingers to a gorgeous limestone headstone.

                “Okay, I don’t mean to freak you out or be weird or morbid or anything but, you told me that I was perfect. And I think that’s a dangerous thing to think in any situation, but especially in regards to people.”

                “I don’t understand. Why did you bring me here?”

                She sighs and shivers slightly in her thin dress. “This is Mara.”

                He looks at the grave. The words ‘Mara Thomas 1994-2007’ are etched in the stone. Blocky text in all caps.

                “I am the reason that she is here…” says Lexa, looking down, looking like she’s struggling to breathe.

                “What do you mean?”

                “I bullied her. Constantly, from the time we were in third grade. I hated her. At least that’s what I told myself. My friends and I would just torture her, mercilessly. Every day I would waste time and energy thinking of hideous things to say to her just because she was pretty and smart and didn’t know how to socialize properly.”

                The cricket chirps sound eerily ambient against Lexa’s wavering voice.

                “And… at thirteen she decided to end it. With her dad’s shotgun.”

                She looks up at the stars, all three of them visible behind the orangish light pollution.

                “It was the worst day of my life, but it was my wake up call. However, I can never take back what I did. I can never give her family back the child they’ve lost. A girl is dead, because of me. I thought that maybe my life would be perfect if hers wasn’t, maybe I would be pretty if she hated her body, maybe I would be smart if I got enough people believing that she was stupid.”

                She hung her head and shook it.

                “No. No, instead I got this.”

                Carl sighed, his breath walking on eggshells.

                “I am not perfect and perfection is a dangerous thing to chase.”

                He embraces her, and she lets him. It’s a long time before either of them can talk again.

                “But I feel like it’s destiny,” he says wistfully.

                “Whoever said destiny was flawless?”

                He nods and intertwines his hands with hers. “Thank you for showing me,” he whispers as the headlights of a passing car illuminates them in the darkness.

Thoughts?

Nightmares, Bath Towels, and Lemonade.

So, I will be out of town for a week again as of tomorrow morning. So that means no posts next week.
Just letting you know. Thanks for reading.



I wake up and my field of vision is alive and teeming with fresh static trying to force me under again. I’m covered in a strangling and liberating sweat from some incoherent nightmare. I must still be straddling that line to the subconscious because the bathtub I’m lying in feels like pins and needles on my backside. Every item on the counter has a sharp edge and every bottle filled up with some sort of solution to break down my insides.
It smells like the light’s been on too long; hours maybe. It’s hot, the air ready to burn me if I move for escape.
My tongue is swollen with the bad taste of bacteria and I fear some deadly cocktail from one of those bottles has already found its way into my system.
There’s that yellow towel, hanging by the door. I carefully slide my hand toward it just to feel its flimsy grittiness and I have this faint suckerpunch of memory about those rivets grating against the skin of my neck, a quiet struggle to scream, to free myself from its malicious tightening. It’s sturdy, made of tight, compact material. It could extinguish me like a candle flame, easily.
Its yellow hue is almost identical to that lemonade that you make in the summertime, the one that comes from the jar of powder and tastes like too much sugar. Some hazy, almost transparent memory of a back porch and sweating glasses comes to me in the midst of the hot light and chill of dark morning. Lemonade sounds like heaven to my parched tongue. Summer calm sounds like salvation to my racing heart.
I think of our stacks of pool towels in cubbies all freshly laundered and ready for June. They’re softer and larger, more colorful than this bath towel. I catch glimpses of them folded around my waist and pressing into my back in my mind’s eye. The towels and memories and sugary lemonade mix into a solution of desire for summer and warmth and thunderstorm security in this half-filled winter.
I make my way downstairs, the steps tripping up my shaky sea legs, to see if we’ve still got lemonade powder stored somewhere in the back corner of the pantry. It’s there. I can see the squatty yellow jar before I start digging through soup cans. Before I’ve got time to think about it, the rising water from the faucet is drowning an island of the yellow powder. The slow gurgle of the stream hitting the pitcher, however quiet, is almost too loud, too disturbing in the picture of midnight.
It gets filled a little too high and droplets splash onto my skin. The slick kiss of water on my arms sparks back my recollection of a towel and a pool and a fleeting summer. The world’s no longer threatening.
I taste a sip of my lemonade and like I anticipated, it’s too gritty and too sweet. I’ve never seemed to manage the proper powder to water ratio. I feel a little bad for the poor souls who paid a quarter for a cup of the stuff way back when.