that one time

inspired by this book. read it not only because it is hilarious, brave, kinky, sad but mostly because it is honest.


it was a musty room.
it didn’t belong to either of us but a friend of his.
we were laying upon the damp bedding like children
as if we should have been swinging our legs and pretending they were swooshing around in a chilly lake, dispersing the minnows as we giggled wildly.
as irony would have it, it became the moment that i stopped being a child.
i realized that i was no longer.

sweaty palms, slobbery kisses and a flickering light.
these are the things i immediately remember.
i was wearing a blue shirt. a v-neck. the colour of the sky.
how i wished i could go see the sky.
but i could not.
i was obligated to be there.
as a certain someone’s “girlfriend”

apparently this label meant he was able to touch me where he pleased.
or so he thought.
his hands felt foreign on my waist.
and as they edged up towards my breasts,
my eyes began to feel with tears.
i lay there, lifelessly.
wondering why he was still touching me as my body refused to respond.
seconds later, i could no longer bare it.
i pulled myself up off that bed and left him alone in that room.

to hell with you and being someone’s girlfriend.

i have never been able to understand why he thought he was automatically given the right to touch me
and why he continued to touch me as my tears flooded the area between our cheeks, my eyelashes thick with dew.
had he not known that my body is mine.
and it deserves more than awkward, fumbling fingers?
i was outraged for weeks.

to hell with you and being someone’s girlfriend.

that certain someone traded me for a cigar weeks later.
the cool grade 5 transaction where someone offers you a cigar
if and only if you dump your girlfriend.



and i am so damn glad he did.

and so it happens

i can tell the story of her last days with a kind of delicacy.

i can recall many things about that time.

after all, as she slept, as she lay there in a drug-induced relaxation,

i watched. i listened. i traced the room with my finger tips.

the funeral was a day to remember.

minutes after finding myself back in that little town,

i felt my heart begin to flutter.

begin to come back to me.

ever so slightly.

i had never been so proud of my lineage.

i had never been so sad to part ways.

and as the words of her eulogy rang out,

i was comforted.

ah, this is where it all began. i thought.

her love of nature. her love of politics. her patience.

this is my lineage.

days later, a friend asked how i was.

she meant it.

she was genuinely interested in how i felt.

how are you

there was such emphasis on the you, i felt inclined to be totally honest.

i am good. i am better. i am at peace.

and i meant it.

and i still am.

but this, of course, is temporary.

grief comes in waves.

it wasn't long ago that i was having a shower.

and as it turned the taps off and the last few droplets of water hit the tiled floor,

i heard my mum speaking on the phone.

it must be gramma, i thought.

it only took a few seconds to realize that it was not, in fact, my gramma.

nor would it be again.

and then i found myself reading,

i read two memoirs and a novel.

each of them tackling death. and the mourning that follows after.

i did not mean to do this.

i was not - really - seeking out these books.

they sort of fell into my lap.

and i, lost in some sort of grieving confusion,

read them all.

last christmas, gramma lived with us for two weeks.

the day she left, to spend new years in alberta, i cried.

as she lay there in her last days, i thanked her for that time together.

those two weeks.

they were lovely, weren't they?

*

the long goodbye - meghan o'rouke

torch - cheryl strayed

wild - cheryl strayed

yes, i recommend them all.