Autumn

To me it is September, and the air is crisp in the mornings, and I am standing in high heels on a yellow leaf.  There is a breeze, and I am only a few weeks into adjusting to this place, wrapped in a thin cardigan with energy buzzing along my neck, heavy books in hand, and as I walk along the stone steps, as the sun rises too-hot in the too-cold air, my heart is gasping.  I feel its beating and its gasping as it tries to span distance, to reconcile the too-many miles from where it is to where it is and I say, quietly and ever diligently, that if I stay pretty and study hard and am oh-so-kind to all of my classmates, he will come, and I take it in like a lullaby and find the best seat in the classroom and open a heavy textbook and a notebook that I have dutifully highlighted and annotated, and I dip my mind into Latin phrases and case law and legal procedure until I am so full that I cannot feel the distance.

And now it is October, and the cold is definite now, the leaves are so many colors and up to my ankles and I have waited for so long now and it is night.  It is night, and I am wearing one of those short dresses that girls wear when they go to bars because they are poor and bars are fairly cheap and their friends are there and no one likes to be alone on a Saturday night.  I do not like to be alone on a Saturday night, so I am sitting in a corner with some friends and it is dark and my friend has had her eye on The Cute Boy for all semester and now they are sitting together and his fingers are on her knee which is curled across her thigh.  And he whispers something and they get up to leave together and she looks back at me, all coy, and her curls slip across her face as she smiles and tips her head, and I give her a smile that says “thumbs up,” and I sip a bottle of beer with practiced precision.  It is late and I say, “I should go, too,” because no one can see that the bottle is almost full and it’s loud and it’s late and I’m tired.  I’m tired, and I make my way home through the leaves that are ankle deep and the air that is cold and the cold cuts into my legs and I make my way up the stairs and slip out of the short dress that girls wear and into a t-shirt that you wore once and I lay down on top of the covers on my bed where you were once, and I curl my knees up to my chin and cling to the metal ropes that run up my bed frame.  And the metal ropes that run up my bed frame are cold in the winter, and I wonder how many more times I lay in that same spot trying to recall your memory than I spent laying in that same spot making memories of you, and I begin the daily ritual of trying not to forget, beginning at your neck, which for some reason I always remember the best, and then moving down to your shoulders and up to your face and halfway down your back, from there to matching stride with you, first inside feet matching, then walking in step, then matching our inside feet, dressed the same as each other like weird yellow ducks in rolled up jeans, and I am curled so tightly and my hands are clenched so hard that I fall asleep and when I wake up you are still gone

“It is November,” is my first thought upon waking, and there are fingernail crescents in my palms, eight total, and I find my way, wheezing, to the bathroom mirror where I rest those palms on the counter and stare into my own feral eyes.  My breath is ragged and I open and shut my eyes to see if they can be any less wide than they are now, but the wideness and fear and dilated pupils stare back at me every time.  Still, human, I remind myself, as I sink to the cold tile and run my hands along my thighs.  Human.  Human, I promise.  But I stand up again to prove it and examine this body that I am still attached to, this place that I am still in, this time that still marches forward, this body that is still old enough to make its own choices.  Eyes snap back up, and I smile at them.  “It’s okay, kiddo,” I whisper, spreading arms wide.  “See?  It’s okay.”  Ragged breath.  Wide eyes.  “Okay, then this,” I say, pumping out push-ups on the counter, still staring into my own eyes.  “Okay?”  And my arms feel weakened but they’re getting stronger, and I whisper, “come to bed,” and light a candle on the nightstand and lay awake until it flickers out.  Or, I want to, but it goes on too long, and the warm glow takes the edge off of the air so I blow it out and sleep to the smell of smoke.