#day1882

the fact of his pulse, the way he pulled his body into mine, out of shame and desire, it made me visceral. his skin was barely keeping him inside. i wanted to take him home. rough him up like a cowboy. get my hands inside him and see how much damage i could really do- like crashing a test car. i wanted him to want me and he was very beautiful, i imagined how he'd kiss me with his eyes closed, pretending i was a girl with soft brown hair and teeth without a gap in them. he'd moan a name that isn't mine.

"i could drown in those eyes," i said. he just stared at me. i flicked ash onto the ground. it's summer, it's suicide; i'm helpless in sleep, and drowning at the bottom of the pool.

guilt and anger taste the same on my tongue. sour. a stale cigarette i keep in my pocket to knead my fingers in when i feel dirty and used up. i can never remember which one is supposed to be virtuous- the guilt or the anger. does that make me your bad thing, your wild thing? something worth hunting across the country to eventually shoot and put out of its misery? you want to kill me more than anything else. 3 quick shots to my stupid infantile brain. this feels like love to me.

i am turning numb. what happened to me doesn’t seem to matter. sometimes i feel angry, but most of the time i feel nothing. i’ve never felt so much nothing before. all i’ve ever wanted these past four- no, wait, five- years is for someone to hold me lovingly, tenderly, softly, and say, “it wasn’t your fault. god knows that. sometimes things are made to be broken. when the glass tears your flesh and the blood stains your skin, i hope you forgive yourself, sweet girl.”

my teeth ache, with how saccharine your voice could be. if you cared. i want to chew and spit you back out, if only to taste you yet again. you stare at me with disgust, i know i’m gross. i’m rotting from the inside out, there is something filthy festering inside me. the smell of decay haunts my breath even now as i sit and write this, perfume lingering on my collarbones. i know you want to forget me. i know you want to leave.

the years really have meandered on and i don’t remember when, but i began liking men who spell trouble. i like them rough, haggard, and i kiss their calluses with my mouth, cupping their names with the sort of reverence i’d once only held for songs of worship. the same hymns i now sigh into their shoulders, into the crooks of backs, into parted thighs.

they hurt me hard enough to leave a mark. i feel a sick jump, a thrill, every time they eventually walk away. maybe the familiarity is comforting, after the abuse i suffered from kyle. these are men that wear more than just rings. my jewelry is on my skin in patches of jagged lines and i tell myself it’s not a type, not a habit. my gentleness and love comes easily to men who tear me apart. long sunsets, the smell of grass, deep woods, moss. that’s all me.

in that sense, i’ve never stopped being desperate, kissing them with fury, and i’ll always just be the bullfighter- the cowboy they dream of on summer nights, once they have a wife and 3 kids. a wistful “what if?” because they miss my lasso. i am only a few floating images. motes of dust. the crickets chirp long after sundown; the men of my past miss my sweet blood and pliant skin. my name is barely a footnote in their lives- i am not thought of, not pretty. but their names are in an impossibly large dictionary, and i wonder when i started keeping a list.

~~~

oh god, i laughed, almost tripping and cracking my teeth on the sidewalk. fuck. dude. look at her. she has long mousy hair and blue eyes. like the ocean. she’s so skinny and beautiful- you can literally see her collarbones and her cleavage from here. holy shit-

so what? does it really matter if she’s pretty? he tried to ignore how stupid i was behaving, eyes never meeting mine. i handed him a warm beer. the kind that i think tastes like shit.

i twirled around, smiling, humorless. he didn’t get it. i lose! i lose! she wins, she wins. she looks like that and i look like me. i come in last place compared to a girl like that, every time. obviously, it matters. she has pretty straight dark hair and no freckles and i look like something stuck in the drain of your tub. have you even seen me? i am ratty, tangled, flat, messy. ignored and gross. i should just end it now. my words felt ugly in my mouth.

jesus, he got up and began to walk away, toward the music and the girl, the bottle tight in his hand. jena, you’re so fucking annoying.

i’m gonna wear that like a badge of honor.

none of “that” was a compliment. okay. be quiet and let me drink in peace, or i’ll honor you again.

yes, ma’am. he wanted me quiet, so i was, but i followed him into the crowd anyway. girl smiled at him, he smiled back. i grinned- i love being right- and felt my heart go liquid warm inside my sternum. i left the bar alone, as i usually do, and i waited with hitched breath for you to text me. it took a few days, but it happened. you were hers. i really tried to be good enough. i can claw at my face and scream all i want but it doesn’t change anything. the anger sits hot in my belly, always a low simmer, and i’m waiting for someone other than me to fan the flames. peach pits are poisonous. this is not a mistake; girlhood is growing fruit around cyanide. i will never be for your swallowing.