Untitled
The music skipped
and it felt like being stabbed
Hudson apologized for the calluses on his hands
I apologized for not remembering how to pray
the weight of his body and things unsaid crushing my ribs
it was almost biblical
but nothing would come from them
my ribs
Hudson tasted of liquor and apples and pillars of salt
He was all marble, heat, Horatian odes, those calloused hands
Sister used to read the obituaries in the morning paper while cutting herself
she wasn’t good at arithmetic or taking tests or dying
I sat on the roof with my books and thoughts of summer–
biking to the beach with friends and stealing sips of warm beer beneath the hot sun
I would swim out as far as I could
so far that I knew I wouldn’t have the strength to return to shore
somehow I always ended up back on the sand
with the crushing feeling that girlhood is not being given the choice to be clean in
the way you’re expected to be
I guess we weren’t all that different
The sofa was beige and I dug my hands into the hole between the stitching
fingers no longer needed for anamnesis
The emergency radio played jazz
While the world ended outside
The hurricane took all of our power for the rest of the week, and by Sunday my body wore a
seemingly permanent sheen of sweat
my stomach and inner thighs slick with it
the wind and rain and constant cover of clouds made the house dark and weepy
and the dog licked every bowl that collected the dripping water from the cracks in the ceiling
shooing him away was useless
like trying to pry off rough hands squeezing my hip bones
while I pretended to sleep on that beige couch that grew mildewed in the damp house–
Just another thing that the storm stole from us
I wish I could tell you he changed again
and that being with him meant I didn’t always have to keep a bottle of rubbing alcohol on hand
See, everything was so sweet for so long
earl grey strawberry cookies I baked on Saturday mornings
and Hudson telling me he thought he was in love after only two weeks
giving me drugs and saying he liked that I was a good girl for everyone but him
It would be nice to say that when my mother taught me to sew, it wasn’t because
mothers always teach their
daughters how to hold everything together
I can still feel the wet, sticky heat of a bloody nose
I can still taste the words swallowed
conversations left unfinished
stains we thought we could get out but couldn't
it was all oxycontin and cartoons
I remember when the lampshade caught fire and how we both jumped up to extinguish the
flames
flesh blistered and burnt
He was so beautiful in the way twilight is
and often held me gently
but still I woke up in the middle of an autumn evening
hurricane season was over
there was a crisp chill in the air
the apartment was pristine and orange
my breath snuck away from me suddenly and all at once
and I left
I, a worm
That, my turning
Once I was on the plane heading somewhere I had never been
I thought of the lightning that struck my little cousin in a southern field at dusk
how the smell of burning hair gets stuck in your nose, but the sounds of a screaming mother
stick with you for longer
how someone so small can be so salient
And how in that moment I knew I would never pray again
Teddi is a coming-of-age screenwriter and poet who came of age in the Natty Lite of the United States: Florida. The daughter of a Mexican Immigrant & a zany Jewish entrepreneur, her childhood was spent embracing all parts of her culture. Now located in Los Angeles, Teddi is a professional copywriter and has written for reality TV. She is represented by 3 Arts Entertainment.