Aftermaths

Jenn Lee

21

Hours Later, But Older

I cannot see the moon.

The sand still holds heat from the day, even at four in the morning. Maybe the sand never gets cold here. Not like the sand in Florida.

I cannot see the moon, but there is a glow. Stars in the sky reflect in the ocean. Stars roll with the waves and crash, white-capped, on the warm sand. Lights from the hotel behind me cast my shadow on the warm sand in front of me.

Shadow-Me stretches thin. She reaches for the ocean. The waves swallow her head. Pull back. Swallow again.

She likes it under the water. It is quiet in the ocean. And dark. And the water fills her ears and nose and mouth, and silences her thoughts and her memories. She would like to live in the ocean.

I hate sand.

I wiggle my toes and dig them into the warm sand. Bury the tops of my feet in the sand and then tug them free, shoveling little geysers of stupid sand into the air.

I can feel it sticking to these pants, crusting around the hems at my ankles, abrading the fabric pulled tight by my thighs. Eating the pants.

I don’t care. I will never wear these pants again. I will leave these pants in the bottom drawer of the hotel room. Along with this shirt, this bra, and this underwear, I will pretend I forgot these pants here in Mexico. It doesn’t matter. The zipper no longer works anyway.

Sand eats everything.

I try not to taste the beer and sangria and tequila on my tongue, but it coats the inside of my mouth. Someone who drank as much as I did that night should at least get to be drunk. I was drunk. I’m not drunk.

I taste salt and sweat and latex, and I try to go back to tasting beer and sangria and tequila. I scrape my tongue against my teeth. I open my mouth and try to taste the air, but it also tastes of salt and sweat and latex. And then everything tastes like Scotch — Johnnie Walker Blue.

Scotch eats everything.

I bury my hands in the warm sand. Dig my fingers so the sand gets under my nails. I make a fist and bring my hand to my mouth. I stick out my tongue. I scrub my tongue with sand. I scour the inside of my mouth with sand. Scrub at my tongue and the insides of my cheeks and the roof of my mouth until I gag. Drool pools at the corners of my mouth and under my tongue. I get on all fours and open my mouth and let it all come trickling out onto the sand. I let the sand and the Scotch fight it out inside my head. I swish the grit around my mouth and spit. It’s beautiful here, and I hate it.

I cannot see the moon.

The moon cannot see me and I am glad.

24

Somewhere Between Five Minutes and One Hour Later (I Think)

I am sitting in the bathtub wearing all my clothes—

It hurts to sit this way. The curve of the tub curves my back and my body doesn’t like that, but the bathtub, I’ve been told, is the safest place in a home without a basement, and this home is a fourth-floor condo in Wheeling, so the bathtub is the safest place. It’s where you go during tornadoes.

So I am sitting in the bathtub—

This is a little like running for shelter after the tornado rips the roof off the house. This is a little like dashing down to the basement after the high winds send a telephone pole through the living room window. This is a little like climbing into a bathtub the next day while the rest of the town cleans up Main Street and the news crews record it all.

The tornado already happened. The tornado is over. The tornado won’t happen again for a few months. And then a month. And then a couple weeks. And then a week.

The tornado is busy playing video games in our bedroom.

I am sitting in the bathtub with all of my clothes on and my body is really starting to not like this.

I get up. Sort of. I move my arms from where they’re crossed over my stomach. They don’t want to uncross. They still think we should be protecting all of the organs jammed inside our torso. But I remind them that the tornado is over— And I remind them that the tornado is over— And I remind them that the tornado is over— And they finally do as I ask.

Uncrossing my arms angers the tissue connecting shoulder cap to neck. I let the flesh yell itself out for several minutes, sitting in the bathtub with all of my clothes on.

I brace my hands on the sides of the tub. My palms throb, so I don’t turn them over and I don’t look at them. If I look and it’s bad, I won’t use them and I need to get out of the tub and I need them to get myself out of the tub. But even turned over, I can see the swelling. I can feel that my skin is larger than it should be.

I push—

My vision narrows until I am looking through the keyhole of a door at the wreckage of a tornado. A door that is the only part of the house still standing. I sit back down. The door falls. This is taking too long. The tornado might come back.

The tornado is occupied. The tornado is hunched over the keyboard. The tornado is playing video games. The tornado is on a quest. The tornado is on a raid. The tornado’s friends are relying on him. The tornado’s knuckles are too swollen to bother. It hurts for the tornado to hold and click the mouse. The tornado is experiencing a rush of endorphins that makes it not care that it hurts to click the mouse. The tornado is smoking a cigarette. The tornado is calm. The tornado is sated. For the tornado, this is better than sex.

I brace my hands against the tub and this time I don’t push, I shove. Sparks of darkness arc around the room. But when they clear, I am standing.

I am standing in the tub with all of my clothes on—

I lift my leg to step out of the tub. My chest fills with broken glass. But I am getting used to these feelings and I need to see. I need to see.

I step out of the tub in the most delicate, most careful lurch. My body is a doll tossed from a trunk ripped from an attic by a tornado. Splintered. Shattered. Smashed.

I stand in front of the mirror—

My face looks normal. My face looks like my face, but I don’t look like me. I look like a doll tossed from a trunk ripped from an attic by a tornado. I taste copper and salt and sand.

I tug my sweater up over my breasts. The flesh around my ribs is the kind of puffy red that will soon be black. Then indigo. Then green. Then yellow. And brown. My blood is too big for my skin. I think my ribs are broken. They aren’t, but they will be. I let my sweater drop back down. I stand against the door because it hurts to sit.

21

Seconds Later

I am still standing.

I think? Am I standing? I think I am still standing. Everything is numb— Everything hurts— Something buzzes. I think it is my body? Maybe my brain—

The front door slams.

I jerk and my brain stands still. Leaving or coming back? Is he leaving or— I wait. I breathe. I think I breathe. Breathe? Is my body rocking? I think my body is rocking. Something rocks my whole body— My pulse? My pulse rocks my body and the rocking makes me dizzy. I am dizzy. Is the rocking making me dizzy? Is the dizzy— Is the hurt— Is the numb? I hear nothing? I hear a buzz. The buzz is a nothing—

He left? He left.

I don’t remember him leaving. Do I remember him leaving? Do I remember—

—looming over me and then I was moving without deciding to move and my body was not my own and I was not inside my body and he was looming and I blinked or something inside me blinked and he was gone and the front door slammed.

I slid to the floor. Did I slid? I thought I slid to— But I am still standing. Still? Still— He left. He left. He is gone.

He is gone, he is gone, he left. He—

—should? I look down— At my body I look down. Look down at my body and see pictures on the floor. Me— Smiling? Dangle car keys over the head of my little sister while she reaches— Him— Posing? In a purple polo with a golf club careful casual on— Us— Together? Bent over a basement pool table with him throwing hands up in the air— In the air in the background— Him throwing in the air— Smiles?

Making me dizzy. Pictures? I think the pictures make me dizzy. Make me— Close my eyes. Close eyes. On the wall I lean— On wall I fell—

Did I fall? I think I fall. I don’t think I fell— I bend. Fire? Fire eats—

—eats my waist hips splits— —eats up my spine spreads shoulders— —eats down my arms down up neck— —eats down my backs my thighs my lines my soles of my feet—

The fire eats everything. The fire—

I hate sand. I hate Scotch.

My fingers creep my body. The frayed edge— Frayed edges feather fingertips. Fingers trace lips. Lips of a wound. Skin exposed to air there— Air there aches there raw and swollen. We are the same size.

I think? Are we of size? Height same? I think same. I think sore— —spot for him. He wants bigger. He wants me smaller. He wants— We are the same size. Am I—

—I am. Strong. Strong girl. I was? I play. I was softball. I was gymnastics. I was lift and carry my father. Are strong. Am strong. Not light. Not slight. I was am strong— Sturdy broad shoulders. Sturdy steady thighs. I am?

We are were the same size. Giving piggyback rides— Always the same size. Always was is he stronger? Is was always this possible? Always will possible? All ways— This will always be possible all ways.

All ways is numb. All ways is hurts.

I am sitting down. I am standing.

Still—?

12

The Next Day

My little sister splashes in the ocean. She loves the beach. She loves the ocean. She loves Florida.

I hate the beach.

I didn’t want to come. I didn’t want to put my swimsuit on. I don’t want to wear a swimsuit ever again. But the woman who is not my grandmother said that I had to wear a swimsuit to the beach because otherwise the sand would get all over my nice clothes, and then the sand would get in her nice car, and then the sand would get everywhere.

I hate sand.

I didn’t want to come. My grandfather said I could stay home with him.

I put on my swimsuit. I put on my swimsuit, and I put on my jeans, and I put on a t-shirt, and I put on my hoodie. I put on my jelly sandals.

I am sitting on the sand.

I am sitting on the sand in my swimsuit, jeans, t-shirt, and hoodie. I am not sitting on the towel. I hope the sand will get all over my clothes, and I hope it will get all over her car, and I hope it will ruin the seats of her shiny new car that my grandfather bought her, and I hope that, months from now, when I am home in my own bed, she will still be trying to suck the sand out of the cracks of her sweaty leather seats. I hope she will hate me as much as I hate her. She could never hate me as much as I hate her. No one could ever hate as much as I hate.

I hate sand.

I sit on the sand, wearing all of my clothes, and I stare at the book I hold clenched in my hands. Every few minutes I flip a page. Just to be convincing.

She asks me if I want to get undressed and go swimming in the ocean with my sister. I say I’m cold. My skin sweats under all of my clothes like some clammy, dead, drowned thing. Like a body dragged from the bottom of the sea. I think I will never be warm again.

Even the stupid sand is cold.

She asks me if I want something to eat. A hot dog or a funnel cake. I shake my head. My braids whip against my cheeks. It stings, and I like it. Everything should sting. Everything should hurt—he ran my hair between two fingers he called it golden sunshine he said I belonged in Florida I belonged in the Sunshine State—If I had scissors here on the beach, I would cut off both my braids at my ears. She asks me if I want an Orange Julius.

My mouth still tastes like Scotch. I think I will taste Scotch forever. I think this is just what the inside of my mouth tastes like now. Scotch and someone else’s bitter sweat and salt. I shake. I shake my head.

I pull my book up higher. Hold it in front of my face until the yellowed pages block out the sun and the sea and the sky and the sand. I hear her sigh. I hear her get up and trudge into the ocean to swim with my sweeter, sunnier sister.

I grab a fistful of sand, and I rub it into my jeans and my hoodie. I take my hand, still crusted in sand, and I scrub at my tongue and the insides of my cheeks and the roof of my mouth until I gag. I push two sand-crusted fingers deep into my mouth until they brush the bruised back of my throat. It scrapes, and it scours, and it stings, and I like it. I like it. I hold the bitterness in my mouth. I hold the sourness on my tongue and count to ten. I spit.

The sand is everywhere.