On the night of her younger sister's dance recital at Carnegie, she blew smoke rings in my room.
She was wrapped in four thin cotton blankets, sitting Indian-style by my window, staring at the darkness draped over the streets. I laid back on my bed, twirling a cigarette between my fingers, grinding my teeth against each other to crumble weary enamel.
Her phone rang and rang and rang and she let out a small shriek and threw it against my wall. I looked up and it broke apart and then we were quiet again.
Later, when I asked why she didn't go, she said children need to have their hearts broken young, this way it hurts less when they're older.
I guess she didn't know that it didn't hurt less, you're just get used to the pain.
~
She was softly corrupted, like rotting teeth, picking up bad habits the way some people pick up languages.
Her father preferred her sister and her sister preferred her mother and her mother preferred no one because her mother was fucking crazy.
When she was twelve, she attempted suicide without even realizing she was attempting suicide. She poured her mother's lavender salts into the tubs and felt them gritting the soles of her feet like sand or bits of crystal. She sank down, letting her bath water swallow her up until she couldn't see anything because there was something missing in her throat and she counted to twelve four times, twelve because that's how old she was and four because that's how old her sister was and then she couldn't breathe and the already murky water got worse and worse and then the door creaked open and Stephanie asked if she found treasure beneath the water and the first breathe of air felt like chewing glass.
She was sixteen when she picked up cigarettes, more of a nervous habit than anything. Her fingers always trembled like the first bits of snow on city branches and she liked to let the smoke relax in her throat, relax the way she couldn't because she was always a little bunny rabbit, rigid with the anticipation of flight.
She hasn't looked back since.
~
I tried to help but Emma, you're uninhabitable, a city for blind mice and children who die in boat accidents.
I'm just scared that the only things left of you will be skinned knees and this new fluttering I have in my voice.
If this is real it sounds like Emma is going through a breakdown, a big breakdown as it is happening in years...Maybe you should try and get her some help or something..It sounds like she does need friends around, she just doesnt know how and why to stop..
This is so amazing!! Your words are beautiful and the story and description and everything... I'm sorry, I just don't have words to even say how talented and awesome this is. My favorite line is: "I tried to help but Emma, you're uninhabitable, a city for blind mice and children who die in boat accidents." It's just so creative and beautiful and sad.