Little [Random] Things

They’ve left me alone here, staring down at those closed eyes, the glimmer of your skin already a cold so white my eyes sting. Did you even realize you were alive in my arms before it was over? Did you get to see my face before you closed your eyes?   Mother couldn’t stand to look at me when they swaddled me in clothes and peeled me from the bed. Her face was the sheer grey of a blood steeped cliff, her eyes empty with the hatred that had grown inside her. “It’s better off this way,” she’d pronounced when I wobbled into the hall, my eyes nearly swollen shut. The ache inside me had screamed, beating little fists against the soft underbelly of my heart. Do you know that when the sharp side of her palm hit my cheek, the stars I saw were the ones that had died in your eyes?   Your face is so peaceful I can’t bear to look at it; it burns in the rage bubbling up my throat until I shove the blanket over your face, feeling my throa...

She hadn’t been able to relax since it had started. She was sure she had started it, though, and the notion nearly drove her mad. She hadn’t known it would be so ugly; after all, she’d never even raised her voice against him. “Darling, I’ve been in love with only you all this time, and I swear she means nothing to me!” she remembered him pleading. “I’ve stopped seeing her, I promise.” He would think she had lost her mind, the way she’d reacted. And perhaps she had, for wasn’t it her hand which had waved the kitchen knife around, forcing him to stumble as he tried to back slowly out the door? She rested her palms on the windowsill, examining the tough backside of her hands, framed by their mottled red nails, thinking of the way the knife handle had felt in her palm, heavy and invincible. She didn’t think it was possible to both hate him and love him so furiously, each emotion threatening to strangle her. And she would never again see him, of course, not after she’d very nearly...

She stared out the window. Maria would be back soon, and everything would be different. She'd known all along. For weeks, she'd felt the resignation gathering in her spine, and now it pressed her to the chair, sickeningly sweet. When he called for her, she wanted desperately to ignore him. She wanted to bury her head under something heavy and never come back out. She wanted to be happy, for once, but his voice demanded her and she unfolded herself from the chair to go to him. They both knew that it would be different soon, and he didn't reach out for her. There were no smiles or laughs or little touches on the shoulder. Before, neither of them wanted to let the other go. And now they were near strangers, again. "Snowing a lot," she said, standing at the corner of the room. She leaned on the doorframe and peered at him, not wanting to get any closer, hating herself for the tiny fingers of panic that tickled her sweaty palms. "Yeah," he answered...

I'm always walking: spacious skies ahead, the weatherman said. Did he not remember to look behind him? Because there's a hurricane coming, eating up the heels of our scuffed feet but no one sees it, no one but me. (They see me through their funny x-ray goggles like they can dissect me into pieces, little tiny jewels plucked from my pores to be chewed on and treasured and thrown away.) I want to look behind me, but I'm afraid- the hurricane's coming, it really is- in my mind the faces- my old, old friends- never waver; the slippery grasps of their hands holding tight to the strange corners of my heart. I'm always walking ahead but today I want to hold on to who I used to be: but the hurricane, the hurricane's hit and all I can feel is a sharp tug as I feel my island drifting away.

5 years earlier When I met you, you were watching me from between your hedges, peering through branches and leaves. Your eyes were blue, the skin of a robin’s egg, polished and smooth. I waved when I saw you, your bright yellow shirt easily visible through the fledgling bushes. You waved back, sheepishly, an automatic response before you dropped from view, quick as a stone. “Mother, who’s that?” I said, tugging on Mother’s itchy sweater. “Mrs. Scarborough,” she said without turning around. She was juggling two boxes and our ugly pink lamp. I stared at the back of her head. “No, really,” I asked again, tripping over my own feet as I hurried after her. “Who?” she said, dropping her load into the foyer and turning on me, blowing bangs out of her eyes in an overly huffy manner. “Him,” I said, pointing out the door to where you had been hiding. Mother threw her hands up. She turned and marched back to the moving van, where Father was chatting amiably wit...