Esperanza Rising

People work there.

There are people who are not just passing through, but show up day after day, clock in, work for hours, and then go home. Where do they live? What are they like? Are these liminal spaces no longer liminal for them? Its a set destination for them now.

What sort of weird shit do they see every day that they just sigh and return to mopping the floor? The unusual that is just another day on the job. That weird otherworldiness at 3am but whatever I’m on a break. 

Perhaps they are immune to the effects of the passing spirits mixing with the mundane, cause how can you be in a liminal space if its your job? Maybe they are special caretakers that keeps the spirits moving on their way, giving directions to things no one else is supposed to see.

we keep the doors locked because crime exists so they make a beep sound when someone’s waiting to enter, but the amount of times i have checked the monitor and there has been nothing and no one there is not enough to say ‘general sensory problem’ but just enough for my anxious personality to be wary of the ghosts.

occasionally i discover large strange bugs i have never seen before that apparently only exist in the dead of a hot summer night. i also watch a lot of spiders crawl across the outside cameras.

once a man came in around 2am – no car, just wandered off the highway – and took every sausage roll and walked out without paying. which okay, theft happens. but he did it, looking into my eyes, and did not say a word as i called after him. he just walked in calmly, looked into my soul, remained entirely silent, and casually robbed the place. i was shook.

a cousin of mine who had been missing for three months once showed up.

and there’s this totally dead period between 3 and 5 where i usually mop the floors. which is why its weird when i find footsteps in my clean floors after ive finished.

plus, time passes differently in the freezer room . i fill up four full fridges worth of coke and red bull and other assorted soft drinks in fifteen minutes – like i’m not trying that hard its really not possible. and i know that because when i do the three fridges that cant be filled from behind, it takes me more like forty minutes or more.

i get strange customers who come in asking for directions with out-dated melways who don’t own phones and seem misplaced in time somehow but are always so very thankful. sometimes they ask for directions to places ive never heard even tho i’ve lived in the area my entire life.

or i get the same person at the same time to get the same thing every day. they have the same greeting and we have the same conversation like we’re stuck in a time loop. these pod people always come between 4 and 5am.

and i can safely say, you will never know fear until there is a 3am power outage in a storm and you are blanketed in absolute darkness so suddenly your heart stops beating. and then you have been outside in said storm taking out the rubbish and become soaked through like a drowned rat with only the weird glow of ur phone light with a painful 3% battery life to guide you.

People work there.

There are people who are not just passing through, but show up day after day, clock in, work for hours, and then go home. Where do they live? What are they like? Are these liminal spaces no longer liminal for them? Its a set destination for them now.

What sort of weird shit do they see every day that they just sigh and return to mopping the floor? The unusual that is just another day on the job. That weird otherworldiness at 3am but whatever I’m on a break. 

Perhaps they are immune to the effects of the passing spirits mixing with the mundane, cause how can you be in a liminal space if its your job? Maybe they are special caretakers that keeps the spirits moving on their way, giving directions to things no one else is supposed to see.

Never. Too many have died for the way they have loved. That needs stop now. 

It is a thin little book.

When I first opened it, I wondered why it was so thin.

Why there wasn’t other books like it.

Other first hand accounts.

I, Pierre Seel, Deported Homosexual: A Memoir of Nazi Terror by Pierre Seel

An Underground Life: Memoirs of a Gay Jew in Nazi Berlin by Gad Beck

The Pink Triangle: The Nazi War Against Homosexuals by Richard Plant

Branded By The Pink Triangle by Ken Setterington

i didn’t realize it for the first few years - something shifting, something so subtle. the winter makes us all cold, the summer makes us all a little out of our minds. i just loved her, because she was incredible, and i was the luckiest person alive.

it’s just that i realized that spring came with sudden bursts of cold. it’s just that summer frequently raged in with fire sprouting from her lips. it’s just that winter was the worst of all, her eyes dead. it’s just that autumn loves me different; throws herself into it without the clingy sweat of summer. i used to love that summer girl, you know? i loved how wild she was, the way in summer she took every risk she could. but i carried her home drunk one too many times, cleaned up one too many of the messes she made for no reason than to enjoy the sensation of burning. and winter was worse; the shutdown, the isolation. how she became distant, a blizzard, caught up in her own head, unable to tell me what was wrong and unable to think i actually wanted to listen.

she comes home, her hair bleached white. a dark smile on her lips. the shadowy parts of her are back. they loom like icicles overhead. she kisses me with her body held at a distance, a peck on my cheek that feels like an iceberg. she makes polite conversation and we go to bed early, our bodies untouching. 

it is a lonely season, i think on the ninth day of this. winter is cold. winter is known for the death of things. when i look at her, i see the girl i fell for, inhabited by an alien. she was the first women i loved so much i felt it would kill me. i can’t leave. when i wake her up with my crying, she tells me to shush and go back to sleep. she’s different like this, quiet, doesn’t eat. 

three days later i stare at myself in the mirror. i wonder if it’s me. if the fat on my body or something in my face or the wrinkles and she doesn’t love me. i try prettier lingerie, lean cuisine, i try different hair, more makeup, try harder. it doesn’t work. she looks at me the same; that empty gaze that neither loves nor condemns my actions. 

somewhere in februrary i lose it. we’re fighting again, from car to restaurant to car to home again. we fight about stupid things, small things; i tell her i feel she doesn’t love me, she says i’m not listening. the circle goes around and around, old pain peeling back, new pain unhealing. i sleep on the couch.

i wake up when i hear her crying, white hair around her all messed up. the kind of sobbing that only comes at two in the morning, heavy and thick and hurting. my winter girl. my heart is breaking. she looks up at me like i’m her anchor. “i’m sorry i’m like this,” she says. and i start saying, it’s okay i’m here we’re married, but she just shakes her head and says, “I know this isn’t the real me.”

i hold her cold hand. she stares at the blankets. “i am different in winter,” she whispers, “i know i am and i’m sorry.” she looks at me. “why do you think i dye my hair? cut it off? get rid of the old me?”

i tell her it’s okay. we’re together and it’s okay, and then she whispers, “i’m sorry you married four of me.”

we lay there like that, her head on my chest. she falls asleep. i stare at the ceiling, thinking of the way she sounded when she was crying. how i helped put her in that pain. how i promised in sickness and in health and everything in between.

the next day i spend at the library. there aren’t enough books on how to love someone with seasonal affective disorder so i make my own, notes and pages and little ideas on post-its. and i take a deep breath and make myself a promise.

she comes home to her favorite dinner and we kiss and she’s uneasy but that’s okay. the next day i bring home flowers and the next day she finds little love notes in her pockets. i love her quiet, the way winter demands, understand her sex drive is faltering; spend more time just cuddling. we drink wine and we kiss and some part of her starts relaxing. 

the truth is there is no loving someone out of their mental illness. the truth is that you can love someone in despite of it; love them loud enough to give them an excuse to believe they can make their way out of it.

and i learn. i remember the rebirth of spring, when she starts thawing. we kiss and have picnics in pretty dresses. i remember her joy at little birds and her rain dancing. i fall in love with the flowers in her cheeks and the little bursts of cleaning. i fall in love with summer’s slow walks and milkshakes and shouting to music playing too loud on the speakers. i fall in love with her dancing, with the sunfire energy. and when winter comes; i am ready. i remember that snow used to look pretty. i fall in love with the hearth of her, with the holiday, with the slow smile that spreads across her face so shyly. i fall in love with how she looks in boots and mittens and every day i find another reason to love her the way she deserves - they way i always should have.

she comes home with her white hair and dark smile and a package in her hands. i ask to see what it is and that small shy grin comes creeping out. it’s a sunlamp packed in with medication. she looks at me with those wide eyes and that beautiful winter blush. “i’m trying to get better,” she whispers, “i promise.”

recovery doesn’t look immediate. sometimes it isn’t neat. i can’t say we never fight or that we’re suddenly complete. but each day, that tiny girl’s strength gives me another reason. i love her. i love her while she tames the roller coaster of spring; i love her for reigning in the summer storms; i love her for taking her winter and trying to be warm. it is hard, because everything worth it is hard. she spreads out her autumn leaves; mixes the best parts of her into everything. learns to take winter’s silence for a moment before yelling in summer. learns to take autumn’s spice and give it to spring. we are both learning.

one day she comes home and her hair is different, but it’s a style i don’t know. i kiss it and tell her that she’s beautiful and the inside of me swells like a flood. i’m so glad that she’s mine. every part of her. the whole. i am the luckiest person on earth. and i always have been. but she’s hugging me and saying, “thank you for helping me,” and i can’t explain why i’m crying.

this is what love is; not always an emotion but rather your actions. the choices we make when we realize our lives would be empty if the other was absent. this is what love is: letting them grow, helping them find their way in out of the cold. this is what love is: sometimes it takes work to see how the thing you planted together actually grows.

Baby Harry would get piggy backs from a huge black dog atthe park and someone would be like “your dog is so well trained” and Lily wouldprobably laugh for ten years and then tell James later

Peter would buy all these baby blankets for Harry all thetime until the others had to sit him down and stage an intervention like.Peter. We are LITERALLY giving blankets away on the street because we have SOMANY. Please STOP buying them honestly.

Lily reading to Harry a lot and Harry would have favouritebooks and James would buy him the magic ones with moving pictures and he wouldgiggle like a baby and Lily would take 8203945809 photos and James would stickall of them on the fridge

When Harry’s two they’d have a another daughter calledEleanor and Remus would paint her room green while Peter hung the curtains andSirius chain-smoked outside pretending he was providing ‘moral support’ whenJames and Lily arrived

Ellie would LOVE chewing on peoples fingers but herfavourites would be Sirius’s and James would say it was: ‘probably all thenicotine’ and ‘I swear Black if my daughter starts smoking I will watch as Lilykills you’

Harry would be really confused like who is she???? How longis she staying???? I mean I like her and all but????? She is pointless and can’teven eat mashed banana that’s pathetic honestly

Harry soon realises that normally what Ellie wants she getsso he would go up to everyone and be all “Ellie told me she wanted to go thepark later and get ice cream” and “Ellie said that she wants Peter to show herhow to reach the cookie jar on the top shelf” or maybe just “Ellie wants somemashed banana”

Harry would watch muggle cartoons with Remus and Sirius like“what the legitimate FUCK is happening Remus how is this girl lost she’s meantto be an EXPLORER and she has a MAP in her BAG and WHY does that monkey haveboots on IT IS A MONKEY”

“Sirius you are majorly over thinking this stop DRAFTING ALETTER TO THE NETWORK”

Harry would start muggle primary school around the time thatLily and James have another kid called Rose and Harry would go around being all‘I have TWO whole sisters. TWO. That is ONE PLUS ONE” because Peter had taughthim a little math before he arrived and Harry would be very proud of it.

Rose aka the loudest baby of all baby’s honestly shescreamed once and literally a window broke and then Ellie tried to sit in allthe pieces and that’s how the lot of them ended up in St Mungo’s and it wasonly ten .a.m.

Harry would do his homework while Sirius sat on the kitchenbench and told him to ‘take a stand against the man’ and ‘fuck school work’ butthen Lily walks in and ‘no lily I wasn’t sitting on the bench I’m helping harrywith his homework like a GOOD GODFATHER okay MERLIN I am NOT a bad INFLUENCE that’sINSANE’

Group photos around Christmas where all three kids aredressed as elves, James and Sirius had a fight over being Santa so they bothhad to be reindeer as a compromise and Remus is Santa and Peter is the ‘reindeerhandler’ (just an excuse to put both Sirius & James on leashes) and Lily isobviously Mrs Claus and they send this photo to everyone including McGonagall.

Ellie and Harry would have ‘secret meetings’ but its reallyjust them sitting under a fort whispering to each other about what’s for dinnerwhile James and Sirius try to eavesdrop

Rose would have SUPER red hair like Lily but Ellie and Harrywould both have black hair like James and Ellie would be all ‘what if she feelsleft out’ and so in the middle of the night James walks in bleary eyed to findhis two eldest children colouring in his youngest daughters hair black with amarker.

Harry being confused at why he has so many baby pictures ina fawn suit like Sirius why are you laughing seriously answer the question whoput me in this suit

Being around other wizards like: “you don’t have a werewolfuncle???? Or another uncle who shows you where the cookie jar is when Mum hidesit????? You must have another uncle who has a motorcycle and lets your sistersbraid his hair. You DON’T??? but then who comes over all the time forDINNER????? WHAT DO YOU MEAN IT’S JUST YOUR PARENTS WHAT HOW

Harry loves his sisters a lot like he would do colouringwith them and watch TV with them and read their lame books and he has suchrespect for his badass little sisters like Ellie helps Sirius work on his motorbikebecause she loves mechanics and Rose doesn’t have time for bullshit because she(quote) ‘just wants to have naps and colour’ like aren’t his sisters the bestever

Don’t tell them he said that they would make fun of himforever you CAN’T tell them

James would pick him up from school like the cool young dadhe is and sometimes Sirius would pull up on his motorcycle like “yeah Rosestuffed crayons down this kids mouth at day care because he called her hairstring cheese and so your parents are currently confounding the teachers so meand Uncle Peter are going to teach you how to play poker while they’re out”

Ellie and Rose being best sisters since forever they fuckingOWN their dad like Ellie could say “Daddy please fill the bathtub withchocolate milk” and James would be half way through before Lily comes home andis all the fuck are you doing you’re the PARENT

When asked to draw his family at nine Harry draws one tallblack haired guy and a red headed lady holding hands, a long haired guy in a motorcycle,another guy with a shirt that says ‘I’VE GOT A FURRY LITTLE PROBLEM’ and adifferent guy eating cheese with two little girls eating lollipops sitting onthe motorcycle bars

Sirius makes Remus a shirt that says ‘I’VE GOT A FURRYLITTLE PROBLEM’ and Remus attempts to strangle him with it at dinner

James and Lily having to have a talk with Rose because ‘babeyou CAN’T keep making things catch on fire at school, it’s freaking out yourmuggle teachers and Peter says that you laughing really hard after you do itmakes it hard to believe it’s really an accident’

Family game night. Just imagine it. They don’t talk about itanymore but just know that the door came off the fridge, Lily threatened to ‘strangleSirius with his own hair’ if he didn’t stop cheating, James & Ellie triedto carry out the threat, Remus accidentally broke Peter’s thumb and Harry had aheated argument with Rose over the rules for ‘Go Fish’

Harry would play soccer for ‘muggle exposure’ in theQuidditch off season and the lot of them all sitting on the side lines cheeringfor him as Lily is held back by James because she doesn’t agree with the refereescall and Sirius, Ellie and Rose eat all the oranges meant for half time.

Parents James and Lily Potter who make breakfast and spillmilk everywhere and are always counting children to make sure no one’s missingbecause once they left Ellie in the washing basket and James would hold a kidwith one arm and eat something with the other and Rose would like how her Mummy’shair is the same as hers and how Daddy tells really good jokes

Ellie would get Peter to tell stories of what they did atHogwarts and she finds it so cool andher parents are awesome and Remus isso smart and her Dad laughs at allher mums jokes and Sirius let her go on his flying bike but only if shepromised not to tell Mum and Peter likes hearing about all her school stuff andHarry is lame but he’s also sort of wonderful and Rose is annoying but she’salso kind of lovely

Harry on the train to Hogwarts and Remus & James made asign that says ‘WE’LL MISS YOU’ and Rose would demand he send back sweets andEllie would try to sneak on the train and would have to be carried off bySirius while Lily and Peter both cry and Harry waves at them out the windowbecause he loves them so much and can’t even imagine what how life would belike without the lot of them