connected to all the women in my family line before me—all their unique experiences of pain.
Inside my elbows: daffodils and poppies. In the shower I smile and cry while shaving my legs. (Water doesn’t feel like the opposite of fire when it draws out my most difficult emotions.) It’s getting harder not to tell Paul how I feel. That I’ve fallen in love with him for his soft encouragements and his patience and his daughter I can’t help but see as me. I’m trying to respect his situation—like I did last night, despite his leg pressed against mine under the bar. There were subtleties coming off him like sidewalk steam. Eye contact that read like a teleprompter. It’s obvious he’s attracted to me too, he’s just got to play it safe. He won’t cut his hair while Imani’s still sick. One of the few details he can control. His mom plays nanny, nurse and cook, and goes to work when he comes home. “I haven’t been that devoted to anyone since, well, never,” I said after a couple drinks. “Is it weird that that actually sounds nice?” He gave a sardonic laugh and looked away. “Is there anything I can do?” I asked, hoping for an invitation to spend time with Zariya—help her with homework or braiding her hair. Instead, Paul asked me for the story behind my scars. And since I was tipsy, I started at the beginning.
I was four years old and staying with my grandparents while my mother was in Rochester for another cancer surgery.
January 2018
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