Paperfinger Magazine

by Lois Goh

I place a packet of Kleenex on the table as I head to the front of the coffeehouse to place my order. I am unsure of the seat reservation practices that Americans adhere to. Cough on people and kick them out of their seats? I guess the Singaporean way of reserving a seat would have to do for now until further forms of education.

I wait in line and try to decide on a beverage that I want. It is rather hot out and the iced pomegranate peach tea is being featured. Pomegranates. They’ve become too popular these past six years. Lobbyists. Pretty sure there’s a pomegranate lobby lurking around. Avocados too probably- I know this because my close friend, (well, just classmate really but I’d like to think we’re close) has been talking about guacamole more than usual. She’s a nice girl; Impressionable, but nice nonetheless. Long strawberry blonde hair and uses a special keratin shampoo- it smells nice. She has good hygiene.

I decide against the iced pomegranate peach tea only because it’s made me think about guacamole and I’m not sure that I can take pomegranates seriously now. I’m at the front of the line and the lady behind the counter has a hair on her sleeve. I want to reach over and dust her sleeve but my neighbor back in Florida tells me that that is rude so I think of excuses to give to my head about why I am not rectifying this girl’s hair situation. I am momentarily distracted when the lady behind the counter asks me, “What drink would you like today, pumpkin?”

Perhaps her inflections and intonations didn’t translate into the appropriate sound waves but I immediately think of having a pumpkin and apple cider cocktail infused with ginger and vanilla.

“Sweet pea?”

“Eww no…” I think to myself, “Would the sweet pea not clash with the pumpkin?” I ask the lady.

“Huh? No sweet pea, what would you like to drink and can I get a name?” the lady ventures cautiously.

I realize I actually do know of an answer to that question but the words do not belong to me (and probably not the answer she is looking for either). They belong to a good friend of mine, Sarah. Sometimes I think Sarah is a pretty awful cook. She has the worst ideas regarding consumables. I remember her calling once to ask me how I thought a cup of limejuice would taste when mixed with chlorine. I told her not to waste her time on silly recipes but invest her time in making beef quesadillas with oozy cheese instead. Yet she was unconvinced and remained bent on waking up brain dead.

I snap my attention back to the lady behind the counter and I get rather excited because she is giving me a death stare. I believe this is what my neighbor had been trying to describe to me when explaining the concept of death stares. I try to mask my excitement at being able to identify this concept in real life and quickly place my order.

“One hot milk for Riley please,” I finally say after arbitrarily remembering my ritual of drinking hot milk whenever I am lost and need some direction in life.

“That’s such a gay drink,” I hear a girl behind me whisper to her boyfriend as they dissolve into hushed giggles.

I contemplate that statement for a little before my mind wanders off to the larger concept of sexuality but it is getting difficult for my brain to concentrate on a single concept. Key words start illuminating in different parts of my brain, coming forth to make an entrance and then retreating into the recesses of my psyche. Sexuality, gender binary, empowerment, feminism, Camille Paglia, 1995- year of the penis? I try to remember what Sarah had said.

Sarah had written to me about how depression and melancholy consumed her being and in response, I had asked her to explore her sexuality. We spoke of phallic worship and about the people we would date. At that time, Sarah was dating this beautiful girl from Finland who baked the best cookies. They were these teaspoon cookies or as the Finnish would call them, Lusikkaleivät and I thought they went pretty well with hot milk. Sarah didn’t think so, she didn’t like hot milk.

As good a cook as the fin was, Sarah would still have her one night stands with men on the side because what is fidelity? And by extension, what is gender? It was a time to explore but soon it became a time to decide. You see, before her name was Sarah, her name was Christopher. So one day Christopher decided that it had been a long time coming and was certain of what he wanted, or didn’t want. He broke it off with the Finnish girl and ordered some hormone replacement therapy pills from India. They were cheap and he was broke. I would not have a chance to taste her Lusikkaleivät again. Christopher was an awful cook. Why hot milk was gay would remain a mystery.

“I have one hot milk for a Riley!”

I take my milk and find a seat. Coffeehouses are a lot like buses. You have to put a lot of effort into deciding on the perfect spot to sit in but I have years of experience. Fat people on crowded buses almost don’t even faze me anymore. I quickly locate a seat by the window and set my milk down. My phone rings and it is Sarah.

“Hi Sarah, you’re alive.”

“I can’t lie on my bed anymore.”

“Why not?”

“My breasts have been growing and now they hurt when I am prone on the bed. The hurt feels so good though. I feel like a woman. I finally feel like a person.”

“Oh, are they itchy? I thought I had two mosquito bites on my chest for the longest time. Then I had to wear a bra and realized they were my breasts.”

“They just hurt, they don’t itch.”

“Oh.”

“Just wanted to share.”

“Okay, bye.”

I put down my phone and quickly leave the coffeehouse. I immediately realize I have left my hot milk on the table, leaving someone else to clean up after me. That is bad etiquette and I feel very guilty but I am in a haste to leave.

I quickly try to locate a cold marble surface to lie down on. I need somewhere to process this information. I find a marble slab bench next to this huge corporate looking building by 18th and H street. I press my body down onto the cold marble. I let my nape feel abandoned, unsupported as my shoulder blades scream out in worthless agony. My elbows start to hurt a little as the marble digs into them but the cold unfeeling surface continue to cleanse me of my feelings. I don’t know how to process feelings, emotions are hard. The marble seeks to rectify that and I am grateful; the confusion and emotions ebbing away and seeping into the marble.

After an eternity of two minutes, I turn over and press down on the marble. My breasts are now squashed against the floor like a beluga to a glass wall. I can barely breathe and the choking gives me some release. The process is almost complete as I start to gain clarity. I do not like my breasts and for as long as I can remember, I’ve just wanted to be a genderless plant. I do not thoroughly understand why my friends say the things they say or act the way they do and I feel stupid. I feel very stupid all the time. They speak of love but I do not feel it and this makes me sad. I do not understand this anger people speak of and I do not understand hurt. I only understand confusion and if I were a plant, I would have a good enough excuse to tell people when they ask me about love.

Most importantly though, I feel uncomfortable being myself and now that Sarah has found herself, I am alone now and it is a stupid feeling. I think they call this jealousy.

I can only sit on my bed once I’ve taken a shower but I’m so exhausted and I just want to go to sleep. Put my head down for a nap but I start to feel nervous, I need to get myself clean or I’ll dirty the sheets. You’re 10,000 miles away and yet I’ve been conditioned to first take a shower before sitting on any furniture. I shall not, will not, must not bring dirt onto the furniture. For we are clean, it just makes sense.

Tuh-woo thirty tuh-woo Spelt with double o’s As her black ink finds my veins, And she smoothes down her dress

We are travelling, look – She paints my skin With the falling rain That is falling over the soil From her worn tiled roof

My hair tips begin to soak, the scent of henna burnt scalp Is a cinnamon heat Fingers dipped in gold And eyes heavily kohled Ready for the burst of embers

We rise in it, before the sun is warm enough to brave the sky We rise in the air, The smoky whisps of Charcoal hair. Anchored by our Full lipped mouths Opened wide So hearts fall out easily, Their slapping sound pleasing To the many sons of sons.

We watch them Rising in the swarms Of our own warm air Entangling their limbs In our kohl black hair And falling as lovers as the night finally cools But still we rise, the trapped warmth steaming The glass of our eyes escaping from the flicks of our upturned lips.

Yanping Soong

If something is a myth, that means it didn’t happen right? Sometimes I think these memories swimming in my head are myths. They weren’t real. They didn’t exist. They never happened to me.

I see him, swimming in my head. He comes in bits and fragments. He carried the New York Times with him, wearing thick-rimmed glasses in the Brooklyn fashion. His eyes — I remember them, piercing into me, both our glasses off. I had leaned in to kiss him. But suddenly, he’s pulling my hair,pressing his weight onto me. “You’re mine now! I’m going to pimp you out! You’re going to make money for me! You understand?” I can’t tell if he’s whispering or shouting.

If it’s a myth, if it never happened, why does it bother me so much?

“She has a master’s in chemistry, but she chooses to be a sex worker,” the Bellevue Hospital lawyer says, as he argues to the mental health judge why I shouldn’t be released from involuntary commitment. I debate whether to contest his statement by saying that I actually only have a bachelor’s degree. My hospitalizations are a blur. This one lasted a month I think. That’s what the discharge report says.

It would be a myth otherwise, wouldn’t it?

How odd how I came here. I remember being distraught. “The next Brooklyn-bound L train will arrive in one minute,” the overhead speaker declares. I close my eyes and see a mythical Eternity, his dark eyes beckoning me to join him. His arms are warm, comfortable, peaceful. I open my eyes to bright headlights and leap onto the tracks.

The train stops half a foot from my face. For a myth, I can remember an awfully strong smell of burning rubber.

“I’ll never jump in front of a train again.” I tell the judge. “I will take all my medications as prescribed.”

It doesn’t feel like a myth. I sincerely believe it. Even if it was my seventh attempt.

He comes almost every night. I feel his mythical eyes, filled with anger, his warm heaviness pressing into me, his words asserting ownership over me, his fingers dancing over my heart. I sometimes wonder if he remembers me, as much as I remember him.

But that’s silly. Myths don’t remember their victims.

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