January 31st, 2014

And, as with any good friendship, there is a silence between us to move within and
when he stops to text his girl, I am comfortable enough to fall asleep. I wake to his eyes
on my eyelids and a smile or two before he leaves to talk to her on the phone. I sleepily
tell him a story as he puts on his coat and hugs me and walks down the stairs, locking the
door behind him, and I brush my teeth and my contacts are glued to my eyes, and I squint
and blink as the toothpaste foam splashes on the mirror. It is Friday. I wiggle in my bed,
feeling the sheets against my skin and I think about the kind of woman I want to be. And
I am getting bored thinking and talking to myself about myself, but I am more bored
by everyone else. I am glad to be alone then, in this night, moving around in all the space
I've carefully kept from my center to the edge of my bed. I am in no state to be entertaining
other people's centers or selves. This bed has room for only pillows and my inching hair
that will soon ink out like a siren's. There are few things better than tending to a garden
and I can barely keep a house plant alive. I use my teapot to water it, but only enough to keep
it between life and death, and I know this at least: that is not the kind of woman I want to be.