living alone for the first time | Tara Metzger

my clothes and books and crumbs of life litter the floor of my cold basement apartment. there’s no reason to pick them up as it’s just me here. i wake myself up. i walk myself to work. i meet me at the door to come home and hang out, just me, until i tuck myself into bed.

looming behind the sound of upstairs neighbors and a pathetic iPhone speaker, are my thoughts. it’s painfully quiet. no matter how much noise i make in an attempt to distract myself from the lack of vitality in each of these windowless, white rooms it’s still so quiet. although i was eager to move out of my childhood bedroom i can’t help but emotionally wince every time i see something that reminds me of Home home.

pajama pants that my mom picked out for me. homemade soup and christmas spirit oils she made me take with.

they make my throat close and my nose burn. maybe it’s the lonliness getting to me but i’m feeling a little bit lonely.

The sensory overload was blaring. Some bass-heavy song attacked the cheap stereo. Bodies were packed tightly into a sticky, violent mess as they desperately devoured their Solo cups to try and go away for a while. As I searched around for the familiar, my body vibrated loudly: only sour-smelling breath and my wet socks. As I weaved through the noise, I spotted the Drunk girl. She was disheveled, and her eyes were slow. Her lashes were droopy, and her face, caked with makeup and melancholy, couldn’t decide if it wanted to droop into a smile or a grimace. I noticed how her static-y yellow hair floated around her head like a crown of thorns, and her dress coiled around her slender frame like a snake as it suffocates its prey. The drink in her hand sloshed violently, and her words zigzagged as she balanced herself on some anonymous frat boy. I noticed how his hand slid further and further down her dress with confidence. I wondered if he would plunder her body tonight.

Rusted out boxes of steel rumble in the distance as I stop to catch my breath. I feel my shirt clinging to my wet chest as it inflates and deflates methodically like an iron lung. Unconsciously, I lift my arms to rest my hands upon my crown in an attempt to capture the cool air around me and relieve myself of the painful stitch in my side. My eyes drift upwards and follow an airplane splitting the clear, blue sky with its plumed tail. It looks like a Southwest airline; it’s easy to tell because of the blue bottom. When I was little, my mom told me that once, and I’ve never forgotten. It’s weird how our brains choose to remember the most useless and mundane information, as if, for some reason, this factoid would serve a purpose. I wondered if I would serve a purpose, but do I even want to leave behind anything in this mangled mess of a world? Perhaps I would know one day, but not now; my brain was stuffed with more urgent matters—

Why do I only ever see old people driving Subaru’s? Fuck, I don’t think I drank enough water. I want to know who names these streets anyway. Where even is Barbados? Do you know what sounds good right about now? A burrito. Yeah, that’s definitely a Southwest airline. I should call my mom.

I lumbered on, now enlightened with the triviality of my existence—and a hankering for some grub.