bits and pieces to soak in.

April fools

“You’re all the same, you know.” Charlotte spoke quietly, but knowingly.

He lit a cigarette, looked her up and down, and leaned back on the headboard of her bed. He smiled and remained silent. It drove her insane. She didn’t know what to think, so she walked away. It was too early in the morning to deal with his relentless narcissism. Her coffee was smelling too fresh, too crisp. Her morning was too positive and productive to deal with his neverending selfishness which was unbearable in this winter. After the loss of her own sanity and the pain of losing it, she couldn’t babysit his ego anymore.

7.

i wanted to meet someone new. i wanted a meet-cute. i wanted a clean slate. i wanted to meet someone i knew nothing about, and discover pieces bit by bit. i must’ve wanted it bad, because when it happened… i was completely oblivious. and then i realized, but i ignored it. circumstance stood in the way, and i didn’t want to complicate things. little did i know that that was exactly what you needed: things to get complicated. but i didn’t want to risk being the enemy. no, i’m sweeter than that. and beside caring about everyone else, i needed to care about myself. i’m better than an interruption. at least i’ve learned what i needed to learn. don’t hold yourself back because of circumstance, distance, or other people in the way. don’t hide what you feel and don’t hide who you are and don’t hide what you feel is right. don’t run away from your desires, because you never know if it’s sitting there waiting for you. and you never know when it will slip away.

i burn and i pine and it is all my fault. i was taught my entire life to ignore love around me. the opposite of the society brainwash that usually fills a young girls’ mind. we are told from a young age to search for love. that love is all life is. from disney princesses being rescued by valiant princes to placing ourselves in submissive positions and waiting for love to come to us. i reached a point where i threw that all away, and the sad truth is that once i did that… love stayed away. and i accepted that because i wasn’t going to take down my goals and drive just to be in love. it simply wasn’t worth it. but the even further result of that is i forgot how to recognize love even when it slapped me across the face.

6.

“i had a dream he left her and came back to me. have you ever had a dream like that?”

i scoffed, “never.”

“really? even after that whole incident a few years ago?”

“no,” i kicked the rocks in my path of destruction, “because i knew it would never happen. i guess my subconscious did too.”

“well, it’s nice to dream, even if it isn’t possible. i felt good until i woke up.”

i rolled my eyes, “what good does that do?” chelsea shrugged and we kept walking.

it was getting dark. it was nice to go on walks with my sister again. we hadn’t since i was in middle school. even though we always detested each other to the great lengths of cracking eggs over each others heads while the other was sleeping, i always cherished the time we did spend civil with each other. back then it usually involved conversations like these, contemplating the meaning of life and why the men in our lives were scum bags. telling stories about our broken hearts, whether it was minor or major. even when i was in middle school my heart was getting stomped on my pubescent jerks on their skateboards while chelsea was the one breaking hearts of all the horny high-schoolers knocking on our door for her. more importantly, we discussed why the women in our lives were scum bags as well and why they had influenced us so. rampaging about why mom cheated on dad and why our aunts were drunks. the more time she spent living with me the more i realized how much we had in common. she was finally starting to feel like a sister and it felt much nicer than i expected.

5.

he was the worst in the morning. i’d wake up hours before him and it was rare when he’d give me my morning cuddle. but that didn’t matter too much since i knew he loved me and that was really all i needed. so i’d watch tv, or try to kiss him awake—he rarely budged. one morning was so frustrating that i went to the living room, curled up on the couch, and watched breakfast at tiffany’s for the first time.

men seem to complain a lot about not getting enough sex from their girlfriends. well, what happens when it’s the other way around? and if i brought it up, he’d still say to me today, “we didn’t have sex enough,” and i’d laugh in his face and remind of him of the morning i begged for it and he wouldn’t wake up. he always laughed when i threw that in his face.

i never held it against him because i thought it was normal. i knew it was okay for someone in the relationship to prefer sleeping over sex some mornings. i never understood why everyone made morning sex such a big deal, and then again i did. we sat at the table eating the breakfast i made. he didn’t read the newspaper and neither did i. so we sat there in silence, sipping our orange juice.

stuck

she sat at her vanity, the light bulbs framing her torso, curling her hair for her date tonight. she wore a rose-printed sheer robe to keep the heat at bay. her full, round lips naturally puckered like a sweet fish while she watched her applesauce hair fall to her shoulders as she let the curling iron down. she was simple, with milky skin and a small mole above her collarbone. she used to hate it, until one night a boy caressed it and told her it reminded him of marilyn monroe. since then she made effort to show it off as much as possible, with strapless tops and dresses filling up her closet.

she was bland, so she dressed herself up with lipsticks named, “passion pink” and neon stockings. she bared her back most of the time with polka-dot tube tops. desired by both men and women, she responded to both. she only took men seriously, however, and allowed them much control in her clay lifestyle. a date every night kept her complete, along with the painted walls covered in magazine clippings. the dim lighting always kept her mindset right while she painted her nails purple or yellow for the third time that week.

quiet and serene, sat on her bed, she kept a box of notes from her pursuers. sometimes she read them, sometimes she cut them into shapes that she pasted to her wall. they kept her lips from trembling herself to sleep before the monsters in the other room barged in to see what or who she was cursing in all her rebellion. to the world she was a barbie; at home she was a rag doll. 

4.

that afternoon we ate in the kitchen. i made us tuna sandwiches—her favorite. we ate in silence (well, i tried), drank our lemonade, and i tried to read the newspaper while she went over the events again. she kept trying to make sense of everything but i knew that would not be happening anytime soon. but i played the “interested” role in the goal of saving my own verbal lashing from her about how little i cared.

“so, why exactly did you two split up?” i asked while taking a bite.

“why? the same reason every stupid couple gets divorced: he cheated on me. he fucked all of the whores i found him talking to on facebook.” she ripped a piece of crust off her sandwich and hastily shoved it in her mouth, staring out of the window.

i try to steer clear of language that crude when speaking about other people, but my sister is another story. she has been swearing since middle school and she does not care who she offends or who hears her. i remember the first time our father heard her swear, if you could even call it swearing. i don’t even know what she did, but i remember hearing her whisper “crap” to herself while we were eating dinner. when she returned to the dinner table dad said, “you better pray ten hail mary’s right now!” he was laughing about it somewhat, but she was clearly embarrassed. he is the only person she does not openly swear in front of to this day.

“who does that? random women on facebook?” i just do not understand people’s dating tactics these days.

“honestly, i don’t get it. i don’t fucking get it. i am beyond the point of crying over that asshole and i just want him to die. or get herpes. or anything horrible, really.” she rolled her eyes and sighed, this cute habit she has when she’s upset.

i was not sure what to say, so i did not say anything. there was nothing really to say. he messed up and she was right for leaving him. of course it hurts and there is nothing i can say or do to make it better for her. all i can do is sit here and listen and try not to gauge my eardrums out after the tenth time of hearing it all. again and again and again.

but things changed when i walked by her bedroom that night to find her crying. i hadn’t seen my sister cry in years. since i was about three, actually. i jumped on her back while we were in our swimming pool. i thought it would be fun to get some kind of swimming piggyback ride, i guess. but i was much heavier than my weakling sister, and she started to panic that she could not hold me. obviously as a three year old i had no idea what was going on and i just kept giggling and holding on. once she started screaming i panicked and started screaming but only squeezed her tighter.

she actually thought she was going to die that day until she opened to eyes to see that she and i were only about ten inches from the side of the pool. it still makes me laugh to think about how ridiculous that was. almost as ridiculous as our mother just watching and laughing while we almost died of mere fright. i never saw my sister in a pool again but also never saw her cry again. the fact that no man had ever made her cry, at least that i know of, but this one actually did, made me want to fly back to their cute little house in seattle and beat him to death. as much as my sister and i hated each other, i could not stand to see her cry. and i detested anyone or anything that made her do so.

i knocked on the door slightly, “chelsea? are you crying?”

“no, no,” she smashed her palms to her eyes and thrusted them to the sides, dragging her mascara across her cheeks, “i don’t cry, you know this. i haven’t cried since i was seven.”

“right. well i’ll be in the kitchen if you need me, okay?”

i cannot stand people who are in-denial and close their emotions. which makes me one big hypocrite because it is the epitome of me. and maybe that is why i hate it so much in other people. i know how frustrating it is to live with. but my sister was not always so shut off. it was ben who did this to her and i knew i needed to settle something with him to clear my mind.

so i went through her phone and wrote down his number. i didn’t know what i’d say yet, and i had no idea when i would call. i just needed it for safe keeping. i was a little worried about myself having his phone number. my self-control is not exactly what it should be, and i was afraid one day my anger for him would get the best of me and i would call before the right time. but who was to determine the right time? it happens when it happens.

3.

“stephen and i are getting a divorce.”

i knew i’d be hearing these words eventually the day they got engaged. not to be a cynic, but i learned not to believe in marriage when i watched my parents fail at theirs. it was an absolute wreck, and when neither of them found love again i knew marriage was pointless. this also meant that my sister was coming to live with me until she picked herself back up off the ground, which i was not exactly looking forward to.

my sister chelsea and i have not been close since we were five and eight years old. her being older than me, i always tried to be her. i’m not sure why. maybe because she was my last option for the lack of a motherly influence, but she was not much better. i was only five when my eight year old sister kicked me to the ground and told me to leave her alone “forever.” it sounds ridiculous and i’m still not sure if i remembered it correctly. all i know is that is exactly what i did. throughout elementary school i pretended she did not exist. we weren’t at the same school again until high school. i was a freshman and she was a senior. at the top of the food chain. she was beautiful and graceful and as much as i despised her i still longed to be like her. she wasn’t in the “popular” crowd but knew everyone.

we spent time together once in a while, but it was mostly to get me to try things. my first shot, my first joint, and my first tattoo. all with her. but after i left for college we didn’t talk. she never went to family events like i did. she went as far away as possible and said nothing to any of the family. seven years later, she comes back and tells everyone she is engaged to the man we saw hanging off her arm. stephen was a small rich boy. not her type. my sister was a flower child who liked to paint smiley faces on her stomach and march in gay pride parades in san francisco. no one understood why she was with this man. but i did, and that was enough.

despite our millions of differences, we understood each other. silent but strong. which is why i let her live with me after the divorce. i knew she needed nurturing, and she knew this was the one place she could get it unconditionally.