Stockings

You cannot hope backwards or in reverse. I cannot undo what has been done. I cannot go back to that day. I cannot choose to stay home and work on my play. I cannot choose to go get pizza with my roommate. I cannot choose to just go the fuck to sleep. Because I cannot go backwards. I cannot go in reverse.

It was a Monday night, I remember distinctly. I was frustrated, tired, annoyed. I was ready for bed, the way every 19 year old is ready for bed after 10 hours of class after a weekend of getting drunk and high and chain smoking and just generally treating your body like shit. I was ready. Counting down the minutes until my head would hit that pillow. Alas, a distraction.

Park benches. White mice twisting in and out of feet. A hand, heavy with intent running up and down my stockings. Okay, don’t think. Ignore. 32. Oedipus is the king’s 32nd son. 32 is old. My mom had three kids by the time she was 32. An adult. A man. He should know better. 32. Cornell. Ruth Bader Ginsburg went to Cornell. He should be smarter. He should know better. But he doesn’t.

He called me beautiful, and I was. Fresh, new, young. 19. Adele’s first album was called 19. But I am sick of chasing New York pavements. Manmade testaments to how we cover up what is real. What is true. 19. Intelligent. Sweet. Of course he wanted me. They all wanted me, if they only felt my skin. Looked into my eyes. They could taste my magic drizzled on my words. On the air. On my lips. But he took my magic.

My ears popped as we went up the elevator. 82nd floor. 82. My mother graduated high school in 1982. My mother. What would she think if she knew? Times Square. Why is it so fucking bright? The lights so fucking daunting as I lie there. My stockings, the blue ones with the pretty pattern, lying somewhere. Where did they go? Where did he throw them?

You can stand anything for ten seconds. But the ten seconds never stop coming. They never end as eternity passes over me. Through me. I count. And eternity finishes. And so does he.

No tears. It’s too dramatic. I am the same as I was ten seconds ago. The same as I was the ten seconds before that. But my skin is not. It is stained. So are my stockings.

And back in my bed my roommate asks if I’m hungry. If I ever finished that poem. If it’s still cold outside. No. No. But no has no more meaning. And it’s too cold inside to tell if it’s still cold outside.