if i had one word left, it would be love

jake sent a valentine, a red construction paper heart with black magic marker words that made me melt. roses are red, violets are blue, bugs are sweet and you are too. i talked to him on the telephone today, about how he’s on the blue cabinet at school and ike is only on the orange, about the oyster roast last saturday, about whether i liked the oatmeal breakfast bars he sent with the valentine (he suggested eating the cinnamon raisin one warm). i talked to alex, too. hi, he said, hi hi hi hi. i have polaroids of both of them hanging above my desk. bonnie got on the line. he said his first sentence last week: i’m stuck. i’m talking to your sister, she told him. sister, he repeated.

it’s first time he’s said that word. those kids mean the world to me. they’re the only thing that’ve made me question my move out here. the desert is so far away from the rose dhu, this neon so distant from the lowcountry. polaroids next to theirs include one of the river, one of highway 278, one of the three crosses by the side of the road, the middle one topped with a christmas-light star, that marked halfway between bluffton and augusta. this last photograph is labeled ‘god in strange places’.

god in the sunrise. god in the nights that it’s easy to sleep. god in the way my fingers feel right, these days, moving like hard rain across these keys. god in my dreaming. god in the way my skin has healed, in the way i can look in the mirror without wanting to look, quickly, away. god in your voice when you called just to hear mine. god in love, the knowing, the giving.

april isn’t so far away. buying spinach and apples and tangerines and almonds in the grocery store, my skin feels electric. our kitchen is small, never enough space for my cutting board, and the burners are electric instead of gas. i imagine large rooms with silver countertops, gas ranges, and my mise en place finished. eating is different, too. the chicken is pretty, but overcooked. it was seared, for the perfect grill marks, before it was cooked, but the grill was too hot and it began to warm too soon. the sauce has a whiskey base, and there’s honey, too. i try to figure out if the sauce should be thinner, if the weight disguises the flavor of the chicken too greatly. the vegetables are overcooked, as well, but the colors brighten the plate. later, i catch myself counting ways of preparing potatoes, wondering if i could dream up something new.

creation. i made two pairs of tissue-paper wings, one light yellow with a cut-out rose design, and the other, a pink and dark green garden. i attached large deep-orange gerberas to my thin, peach-strapped flipflops, and a big floppy pink silk rose to my purse. i was dreaming of butterflies, that’s why i made the wings. i’ve been dreaming of flowers. i think i’m blooming. i took photographs of the wings, of my feet in my flipflops, of the sunrise. — and i’ve been writing. there are stories i’ve never told, and maybe it’s time to tell them. there are stories that aren’t mine, but that are being born in my blood, under my skin, looking for a way out. lying in bed before sleep, i massage my hands, thanking them.

he’s so easily become one of my best friends. our conversations are like the ones i missed from boarding school: word origin, politics, social debate, history, ethics. there are memories, too, our own stories and stories from friends, figuring out our hearts and heads. we were talking about what we like about ourselves, tonight. i decided my favorite thing is that i’m not like anyone you’ll ever meet. sometimes that’s a good thing and sometimes it’s not, but even if i have my ordinary moments, i am something original. i live my life like it’s mine, and i don’t know that many people who can say that and mean it, these days.

a small unsent letter: you said it like i wasn’t, before you, and wouldn’t be, after you. maybe you thought i wasn’t anything without you, but you were wrong. spices don’t create the flavor of the food, they embrace it. you complemented, but you were never the chef. i’m laying claim to my history, my own identity, my ability to stand on my own two feet. we were something else, but i’ve always been something on my own. still- as a writer, i miss knowing your thoughts. but it’s too late for that, isn’t it. — for what it’s worth. i’m sorry that it’s come to this.

an ending. i’m beginning every day.