In My Anger

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I don’t think you understand how hard I sobbed on plane the that night. Screeching, screaming sobs that shook me. No one heard except for me. I had ordered 4 cups of wine, and the altitude made me fucking drunk. There were too many shows on the tv to choose from, but I chose the right one. Or the wrong one, because now I’m sobbing. Tears are falling fast, and I keep wiping them but it’s not fast enough. My chin is trembling, but my mouth is thankfully locked shut.

A death takes place in the outer lands — the place where they go. My friend now Iives in the outer lands. I try to figure out how to reach her, but there’s no way out. Seatbelts are holding me down — burly men guard the emergency exit — the one I woud like to use.

Tears are still streaming — the show I'm watching is too specific. Her friend is also dead, except that it’s her sister and it’s different. It’s always different because my friend was too young, my friend was too beautiful, my friend didn’t have to die.

Sickness is different.

It took me years to feel normal after that. I got home, unpacked from my trip, and sunk into a hole. I tried to buy a new outfit, new jeans, top and shoes. I saw a movie. It was a hyper specific one, and I left the movie theater sobbing, only making it to the bathroom before I devolved into loud hiccupping sobs. I”m sure everyone heard me, but I coudn’t care. The tears just kept on coming.

When a year had passed everyone said it happened a long time ago, but life was still so dull.. You were dead and you had been alive. You had plans, and then you died.

It’s two summers later. My friend is dead, but her sister has moved in.

I’ve been lonesome this summer. I have a new roommate, and my boyfriend is great. But I’m awful lonesome this summer.

There’s a man who sits on the street corner outside. He sleeps there too. Wakes and bakes and lives there too.

I like him, he’s dirty, he looks Ike he should be homeless in the desert. He looks like he’s been in the dessert, only popping up into the city in time to see me pass by.

I’m lonesome, and so I buy him dinner, cigarettes, and we eat and smoke together. I buy him what I smoke; Marlboro lights. He doesn’t complain, and he tells me stories.

He took a bus once — cross country. He saw the desert. He loved the journey — woud like to do it again.

He thinks he would be a good pool boy, could Iive and love in the arms of a rich older woman. When he said this, he looked at me Iike I might be rich.

I don’t see him anymore. He’s been gone from the corner — he was there , and now he isn’t. My new roommate isn’t so good anymore, and my boyfriend broke my heart. My friend is gone.

I sit on the corner alone.

One night I see him, sweaty, crazy, a wild animal.

“Quick walk with me, walk with me” he says when he sees who I am. I try to buy him food, but he will not come. He wants me to come with him, but I cannot do that. He scares me this way.

I get angry when i miss my friend. When she died I was just numb, then I was numb in a sad way, now I am just mad. It drips from my toes and onto floor. It seeps onto other people. It tickles their toes.

I am alone in my rage. I am mad about other things too ,but it all comes out whenever it needs to. Even if it’s nothing I’m sad about, even if it’s not about her. I am still angry.

And it’s in my anger that I sit alone.