I’d slump my way to a penny arcade

like an old gambler at the breakfast shift in Vegas.

Bag full of copper, gut overflowing with the

bubble front bloat of my period panties,

doubled over at the waist, sticking my face right up against the glass

as the small silver ball

pinged from left to right inside.

I wouldn’t play just one penny at a time

there’s no need for restraint

when your cup runneth over.

If I had a penny for every time I’ve been called mean

I’d chew on Nicorette while rolling loosies on the counter top,

sticky with old soda and candy-coated, too-small fingerprints.

Not because I need the hit

but because my monumental meanness

is something I can smoke,

something that closes my airways and stains my teeth.

I also look cool while doing it.

If I had a penny for every time I’ve been called mean

I’d call the neighbor’s kids over to my machine

COME ON OVER KIDDOS

my voice like gravel on ice

my hands slapping the sides of the box

urging the ball to get in the hole.

I’d create a scene just to get a little satisfaction

just to teach you a lesson

in how it’s done.

If I had a penny for every time I’ve been called mean

I’d play that stupid game until I was kicked out

fingers burned raw, lips dry with someone else’s stale air

children gone home to their families

to tuck themselves into bed.

If I had a penny for every time I’ve been called mean

a teenage boy outside would yell

MEAN OLD HAG

just as I was heading to my car, hitching up my panties

and spitting something black on the sidewalk.

I’d spend one minute looking at him

as a metal ball pinged around my brain

knowing that with a handful of rust and a gracious grin

I could get him inside for a match.

If I had a penny for every time I’ve been called mean

I’d let him win.

I’d tell him he was so beautiful when he told me

how to do it just like him

and I’d ask him to explain what he means

when he says that being silent is the

same as being nice.

If I had a penny for every time I’ve been called mean

I’d pour them out at his feet.

I’d tell him there’s no winning when the game’s been rigged.

I’d watch while he scooped them up

and handed each one back to me,

our hands full of dirty old men.

If I had a penny for every time he’s said

here are your pennies

you mean bitch

I’d crawl back to the car

weighed down with more than I’d come with

content in the knowledge that I beat the house

drunk with the richness

that meanness can bring.

There is no word

for the feeling of loss

that accompanies

no longer being able to Rebel.

I’m not talking Sneaking Out At Night

AIM Signed In To Hold Up My Phone Line

Mom Is Out On A Date Again

Let’s Go Look At The Stars

Rebelling.

I’m talking Four AM Cigarette Tongues

And The Back Corner In That Old Bar.

I’m talking Finishing A Handle

And Reaching For A Fifth

French Fry Smile And A Beer In My Pocket

Hands In My Shirt And A Laugh

Hanging Hot In the Cold

Air Just In Front Of My Teeth.

Life isn’t made on sidewalks

in the dark but

sometimes it feels good to pretend.

To stumble into diner booths

at six am ordering

chili and eggs

because the protein soaks it up

as I pour salt

on the same spot

I’ve been pouring it all night

because “just once more, why not?”

To stand on a corner all alone

eight in the fucking morning

laughing with all of the versions of me

that thought it was a good idea

and ignoring the ones that didn’t

knowing I’ll never be this much

of anything ever again.

I don’t need a big life

a grand life

a life worth living even

but somewhere in me

is that girl with square shoulders

whose gums bleed

the morning after.

The one who says,

“might as well,”

and

“I’ve got nothing to lose,”

and

“go on and try me,

give me everything you’ve got.”

I was born into a world of absolutes.

The sky is blue. The grass is green. The boys lie. 

I drank them in like water, strengthening my just formed flesh. These were known, rather than felt. But still, they were true.

The mom loves. The dad works. The families function.

After years of knowing the bees sting, I was finally stung on the playground outside of classroom three. I experienced the searing pain in slow motion, like the moment before an impact, the knowing and the feeling finally meeting, hazy and bright. They were right, when they told me it hurt. But no one had told me that the bees die.

I learned to cling to facts, hanging on with my tiny fingers even if it felt like I was dangling from a cliff. They armed me with the steel wings of an abridged bowling lane; they kept me from falling into the gutter.

I knew that if I kissed a boy, I would get pregnant. I knew if I kissed a girl, I’d go to hell. I knew that if I wandered too far, my mother would scream in that high-pitched way Greek mothers do, as if the supermarket floor had turned to soup and was slopping over the edges of the Earth, eager to join the sky’s runoff, longing for that meeting place somewhere yet unseen.

In fourth grade, they taught us the meaning of “if, then” statements. If I am this, then I am that. I filled up pages and pages of dotted lines with facts and figures, each deserving of their own gold star.

If I am sad, then I am choosing not to be happy. If I am hungry, then I am pretty. If I am the right kind of girl, then I am wild, but tame, hair flowing behind my back, but in a manageable way, sea salt staining my perfect skin, rigid with morality but soft to the touch. If I am the wrong kind of girl, then I am almost everything else.

This I knew.

In high school my friend said to me, all of my greatest friends are Leos and they are all assholes.

If I am a Leo, then I am an asshole.

I am a Leo.

The teachers told me if I cared about my education, then I’d show up. When they spent the first thirty minutes of the class rolling up their sleeves and drinking in their hot waters, telling us to sit and be quiet and read, I stopped going.

If they cared about my education, then they’d show up, I thought.

I knew I talked too loudly, had too many opinions, looked at people too sternly. They said if I was smaller, then I’d be perfect, so I turned myself to liquid and sank beneath my floorboards. I oozed between the cobwebs and the broken screws. If I can take up the smallest space, then I am the smallest space.

If, then.

The first boy that showed me attention, who grabbed at my skin with sticky fingers, who folded his lips around the smallest corners of my body, told me, if I loved him, then I’d let him do with me what he wanted. When I promised I loved him but wasn’t sure, he punished me by joyfully jamming his uncut fingernails inside me for an hour. If this is what love felt like, then it hurt.

I wanted out from beneath the canopy of knowing. I wanted to feel, too. But the world pointed its fingers at me and told me I couldn’t afford to leave. I walked up to bank windows and shook hands with every locked door. They laughed from the inside, hoarding their money like candy, like piles of food, like clean water. Finally, they asked me to turn around and bend over as they piled stacks of paper on my back, caressing me with promises of blank checks. If I default, then I am yours, I said gleefully, with a flourish of my electronic signature.

The real world had its own set of absolutes, but it wasn’t sharing them with me. I dove into its secrets, hoping to figure them out. But feelings were scarier than fact and I wore my rules closer to my body, strapped to my limbs like weights in the water. I allowed myself continuous movement while going nowhere, often knocked over by the current of those around me.

I swallowed their words, their stares, their touch, their semen.

The men told me that if I was just a little prettier, I wouldn’t have to be smart, and if I was just a little smarter, I wouldn’t have to be pretty. If I am neither smart enough nor pretty enough, then I am neither of those things at all. I became less feminine, a little harder and a little angrier.

If they can’t break me, then I can’t break.

I stopped looking down, instead staring into their eyes. If I lost my nerve, I shifted to the spot just above their right eyebrow; backing down without letting them know it.

They called me a bitch, sassy, mean, cold. A control freak, as they went about their day, grasping for control with their long hands and small dicks.

I came out from under the floorboards and curdled by the radiator, hot and bubbling. Summer came and the radiator became too greedy, always asking to hold me too close, stifling me with its needs. I slid up the bed frame, circling the twisted sheets before allowing myself to take over the mattress; king sized and alone. A stranger on the train grabbed me close and shoved himself into the back of my body, whispering sharp words into the nape of my neck. I responded by consuming the mattress, crunching on springs and strings, spitting out flowery pillows, dressing myself in bed skirts.

I ate all of my books. They told me I knew less the more I learned, told me how insatiable I was after a lifelong acceptance of hunger. I expected promises like the Bible, absolutes and truths, and instead ingested theories and questions and a stunning lack of rules. I grew bigger as I shed layers of myself.

The mirror laughed at me until I stared at the spot above its right eyebrow. My closet burped with the knowledge of things past. My coats called to me with the promises of winter, with wrapping myself up tight and disappearing in the snow. But I ate them, too. I ate my way through the hallway, the living room, the building with its numbers “152” scrawled on the brick outside.

I became a girl who was just sad, or just happy, or just awake. I kissed a girl and imagined what hell was like; if it tasted just like this, sweaty and sweet. I dressed myself in the trappings of the wrong kind of woman; my hair became unmanageable, my skin became wild. I defaulted and wrote the bank a check for the detritus at the bottom of my purse; a memo line consisting of “lint and old gum.”

On my twenty-ninth birthday, the sun called my name. It said, be like me, bright and earnest, overpowering. Hurt others with your glare. I stared into it until the sky started to explode, until my eyes started to drip down my face. I told the sun, I’m alive, I’m alive, I’m alive.

It shadowed itself with the moon, allowing me just a moment, telling me I can also be soft and tired and quiet and dark and whispered back,

Yes you are. Absolutely.

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

Title: August 21, 2017

Genre: Poetry/Short Story

Age Range: 14-?

Word Count: 1273

Author Name: Christina Connerton

Why it's a good fit: It's a good ol' piece of writing I think you'll like.

The Hook: "I was born into a world of absolutes" because we all were.

Synopsis: A girl learning to be alive.

Target Audience: Women, young adults, teens, everyone?

Bio: Christina Connerton is an OC-raise/NY-bred/LA-living writer and producer who just wants to write words, drink wine, and hang out with kittens. As a dancer, she learned the act of storytelling through movement, at work she focuses on storytelling through film, and on the side she creates her own story with words.

Education: BFA (Dance) from NYU, MSW (Social Work) from CUNY Lehman

Experience: I've been writing my whole life. Writer behind www.chroniclesofabarmaid.tumblr.com, and www.alalanews.org. I just recently started writing poetry and have submitted to some contests. I am currently working on my first pilot.

Personality/writing style: Personality: Sarcastic and introverted with a touch of giddyness and a sprinkling of righteous rage. My style ranges from comedy to parody to poetry to drama depending on the mood.

Likes/Hobbies: Writing, rescuing kittens, making films, making plans and not following through, singing, sitting on my couch and turning into a pile of pudding.

Hometown: Irvine, CA

Age: 29

August 2017.

Wyoming was on fire.

At least, that’s what the unexpected explosion of color first looked like to Jane. After two days of flat land, the sudden change in scenery was shocking. The hills were littered with daisies and dirt, hues of red and orange tumbling up and around themselves for miles.

She pulled off at the first opening on the side of the road. Looking around herself, all she could see were hills. She let her eyes adjust to the strangeness. It was like drinking whiskey after a dry spell, the summer after a winter full of South Dakota’s corn fields.

She got out of her car and walked up to the small metal barrier that was supposed to save you from falling off the road. When she was a kid she thought she was supposed to walk on these and, while attempting to pull herself onto one, almost killed herself. Her mom wouldn’t stop yelling about how it would have ruined their entire trip if she had died. Still, she liked the steadying feel of the steel against her shins, so she leaned her bodyweight forward and looked down.

Yep, more hills.

Jane took a deep breath and had to fight the urge to cough. After New York, she thought she’d welcome fresh, unfiltered air, but for the majority of this trip had found it sharp. She imagined the air was filled with spiteful, rectangular bugs, intent on burying themselves into her lungs as punishment for ten years of city-living.

Maybe it’s the allergies, she told herself again. She blamed most things on allergies. A light cough in the morning? Allergies. Sniffles in the afternoon? Allergies. Blinding panic when someone tells you they love you? Allergies, probably.

She walked back to the car and reached into the open passenger side window, grabbing the pack of American Spirits she’d bought as a bon voyage treat for herself while driving out of Brooklyn. The purchase made no sense — she was only ever a drunk smoker at best — and the need to buy them seemed even stranger when compared to how hurried she was to get out of town. But stopping for them had seemed cathartic; the box made her nostalgic for something she wasn’t sure she had experienced and the yellow color of the wrapper seemed appropriate for the open road. The pack had come in handy. Ten hours through rural Pennsylvania can really start to mess with your mind and, while clutching her knees in a surprise panic attack on the side of the highway, the cigarettes were the only thing that stopped her tears.

It wasn’t like she wanted to leave New York, she thought again bitterly, for what felt like the thousandth time. Being forced on a spontaneous cross-country move would freak anyone out and after the last year, she was more anxious than she’d ever been in her life.

The vivid image of her hastily packing up her apartment flashed in front of her eyes. Her cell phone had just kept ringing and ringing, a warning she had prepared ahead of time with a friend. But she wasn’t done. Panic stung her throat like bile and she knew she was running out of time.

Jane stopped her thoughts with a long drag of a cigarette, but still looked around herself quickly to make sure she was alone. She wasn’t going to think about that for at least another few hours. As she drove out of the city, she promised herself she would think about nothing until she got to the Badlands. That felt like a good halfway mark between where she was and wherever she was going. But it’d been a day since she parked on the side of a dirt road and looked into the abyss and she still wasn’t ready.

Next time I reach a real city, she thought. I’ll figure it out then.

Besides, she didn’t want to disrupt the calm quiet with stuttered thinking and gasping breath anyway. She threw her almost finished cigarette into the ravine below her, a children’s song popping into her head about the dangers of littering, and turned around to head back to her car.

Parked, facing hers, was a black Camry. An old man with a white beard stood beside it, peering down at the view below. He looked cheerful, like a mall Santa. Jane remembered she hated mall Santas and a repulsed shiver ran down her back.

Maybe cars are quieter in Wyoming, too.

She chastised herself for not being more aware of her surroundings. What a rookie mistake for someone recently on the run. She hadn’t felt safe for the last six states but Wyoming, with it’s ocean of flowers and shores of rocks, felt comforting for just a second.

Stupid, Jane. Nowhere is safe.

She fidgeted with the pack of cigarettes as she casually walked back to the car, trying to avoid the attention of the stranger. As she reached for the driver’s side door handle, he called out.

“Nice to see another face here. I was beginning to think no one lived in this state at all.” He was watching her in a friendly way, hoping to engage.

“I’m not sure anybody does,” she responded. He stared at for her a second, thinking.

“Maybe not,” he said, with a smile and a shrug, and turned back to his view.

She dove into her car and started her engine, throwing the pack of cigarettes beside her. Reaching for the back seat, she ruffled the ears of Sugar, her eighteen-year-old cat, who had been sleeping peacefully on a pile of pillows and blankets. Sugar meowed and stretched lazily, enjoying the summer heat through the windows.

“Sorry for this,” Jane muttered to her, and hit the gas hard. Sugar toppled out of her seat with a hiss.

As Jane tore out of the rest stop, she self-consciously checked the rearview mirror. The old man was staring after her. Just as she was rounding the corner, he pulled out his phone to make a call.

I've never understood people who cry easily.

It's not like tears live quietly behind your eyes

awaiting their escape 

down your long, curved cheeks.

It's not like they sit pooling, waiting for the right moment

to jump ship

drowning you in 3am pizza and lazy kisses from the neighbor.

They don't smother you softly,

slowly,

surprisingly,

like the morning wood of your ex-boyfriend

deep in your sleeping back.

Tears start low and deep,

in the chasm in your chest,

in the 

space in the bed where your lover turned away from you,

saying not. now. not. again. 

I've got no time.

I'm so tired.

They claw up your sternum,

gnawing at your clavicle,

knocking on your bones.

They sing the song of your mother

who can never be happy because she can never take blame

and, instead, throws it on you like acid

a childhood full of shame and silence, but not tears.

They rise in your throat like bile

reminding you that one time

you were so unlovable

that your dad just never came home.

Not because he was that bad

but because you weren't that good.

I've never understood people who cry easily.

When their world is the same

as it's always been

and they've never experienced the shift of the universe

when someone you love

tells you they can't possibly love someone like you.

Tears don't fall gently down unsuspecting cheeks.

They clench themselves into fists

in the blinding spot that stretches infinitely into forever.

They turn to pus and ooze out of your mouth like fire.

Infecting everyone around you

until you teach them all a lesson.

Until they all stay away.

This morning you called my name as you closed the door.

I woke up and made myself breakfast. The same thing as always -- toast with jam, no butter. Butter always makes my throat shake.

Afterwards, I sank into the couch to prepare for the day. 

The couch got bigger and wider, longer and deeper. I crawled inside of it. I cloaked it around my body and bathed in it. The pillows turned to life rafts, the ground turned to lava. 

I played games in there. I talked to you. I touched myself. I sailed it across the Mediterranean in search of my ancestry. The waters were treacherous and when I finished my harrowing journey, there was nobody there. They'd all died long ago. I was the only one left. 

I pitched a tent on it and camped in the Sahara. I smoked hash and dreamed of my mother.

I opened it up and created a coffin. I buried myself in it and spoke my own eulogy. The crowd couldn't stop crying and pointing. I giggled to myself.

It turned into your bed and there you were, putting your hands on me. Your bed started to shake like an earthquake but the walls stayed still. The deeper you went, the farther I followed. I slipped off the edge and burned up alive. 

The couch became my blood and surged through my veins, vicing itself around my heart, stinging my throat, pulling me back to safety.

I sank into the darkest corners and held on. My arms stayed pinned to my sides, my eyes stayed wide open. But the couch swallowed me up and took me away. 

She woke up early that morning.

This happened every time she had something particularly stressful to face; tests, deadlines, that time they held a costume party at school and her mom spent a week sewing various pieces of felt together in the shape of a sailboat. 

But this morning was a little different. 

Today was Sorting day. Every ninth grade girl in Quanton went into the Sorting. It was kind of like a right of passage. Just last week They had explained that a right of passage is a ritual that one undergoes to achieve adulthood. They said every great culture had them. But she had never seen anything great come from the Sorting.

Last year, her older sister, Diane, went through it.

Diane used to crawl into Sophia's bed at night and brush her hair. Sometimes she would raid the pantry and bring back a bowl full of blueberries, even though they were on ration. They would stain the sheets blue, giggling through their closed lips.

But then Diane was Sorted. It only lasted a minute, but afterward, everything changed. She grew her hair long and braided it down her back. She stole coal from the fireplace and wore it in big circles around her eyes. Sophia sometimes even caught her pacing the perimeter of the schoolyard, eyes straight ahead. Diane didn't crawl into bed with her anymore. She didn't really do anything at all.

Weren't rights of passage supposed to be fun, anyway? Sophia had read all about these lavish parties fifteen-year-olds used to have before the Awakening. She had picked her way through the pile of salvageable books in the old, burned up library on State Street. A tired, wilted magazine had seemingly hundreds of photos of brightly colored dresses, adorning girls with smiles almost as big as their crowns. Fifteen years old was only a few months older than her. She wanted a party with a ballgown. She wanted a crown.

Now, standing in line behind a few of her classmates, she stared down at her grey, shapeless uniform and thought her life couldn't be any different than those magazine girls'. The door loomed ahead of her like a giant mouth, chomping up her classmates and shoving them out of sight. 

Her hands began to sweat.

She pushed open the door and for one, long second everything was dark. 

Then she heard her a familiar, though out of place, voice.

"Sophia..."

Mom?

"This isn't meant for you."

In the darkness, she felt a pair of hands grip her shoulders tightly and steer her around in circles. She heard a grunt, felt a shove, and blinked into the light of the hallway. 

Confused, she turned to see her classmates enter the room she was kicked out of. Their shapeless, grey uniforms looking more and more like ballgowns, the right of passage seeming grander and greater the farther away it got. 

Every ninth grade girl goes to the Sorting. 

Every one. 

But one.

First you get her to love you. Then you leave.

It’s best to start on a cloudy day. This way she associates falling in love with you with the mist that rolls in just before dawn, the lingering humidity signaling the end of summer and the start of something else.

Get real close to her and whisper in her ear. Invade her space. Let her feel threatened until she’s not. When you kiss her, make it gentle and then taste her teeth. Overpower her with softness and desire. When she buckles like a small animal learning to walk, be there to catch her. Tell her you’ll learn together.

Push your way into her life like a train with a blasting horn, like a pushy neighbor who demands sugar and time. Infiltrate the tiny cracks in her apartment like caulk. Be useful and attentive. Proceed with caution. For the one friend who expresses wariness, sew the seeds of doubt. Her friend must be jealous, you tell her, as anyone would be jealous of someone so beautiful and self-assured. Poison her with your distrust until suddenly she believes she’s outgrown that friend. Be her new friend.

Tell her you love her sooner than she wants. When she questions you, cry. Be vulnerable to a fault and strong in your convictions. Remind her that you aren’t like the others. If she can’t handle someone who feels as strongly as you do — if she’s scared — then maybe she isn’t ready for you. Don’t back down until she decides she’s ready for you. She’ll get there sooner than you think. Like all strong and sympathetic women, she loves rising to a challenge.

Cook her a turkey for Thanksgiving and meet her parents at Christmas. Spend New Year’s in a crowded party, surrounded by lights and champagne. Kiss her at midnight in such a way that she’ll forget anyone else is there. Even though she doesn’t care about Valentine’s Day, get her a card anyway. And flowers. And a massage.

With each passing day, remind her that she’s wonderful. Then, when she starts to accept this as her new normal, stop.

When she sends you a funny photo of her cat, don’t respond. When she asks you what time are you done with work, and don’t you like this new dress, and how about Thai tonight, have other plans.

One night after a bottle of wine or two, ask her why she never hangs out with what’s-her-name, the old friend she thought she outgrew. When she reminds you of the old jealousy with narrowed eyes, feign amnesia. Tell her you always liked that friend; you found her vibrant and sexy.

After a few weeks you’ll feel the tension lingering just below her skin. Notice how kinetic her panic is, like dry kindling just before it ignites. Decide on a nearby destination and have one really great weekend with her, covering her body in yours and breathing into her neck the promises of last Fall.

When you get back to her apartment Sunday night, fall asleep with your face pressed into the back of her neck. Clutch her close. Make her feel safe and wanted. When she leaves for work the next morning, ask her what she wants for dinner.

It’s best to leave when it’s warm out. This way she associates heartbreak with the sun at its highest point in the sky and strangers milling about happily in the park. Leave a note telling her you’re tired of her, or not in love anymore, or suddenly scared of commitment. Anything but the truth. Fill her vases with flowers and leave your still-packed bag lying open on her bed, reminding her of the trip you just came back from and the way your mouth curled around her fingers. When she calls you, be curt. End the conversation while she’s still in tears. Be cold and practical. When she calls you back, don’t answer. Turn off your phone and delete her messages.

Change your relationship status and post photos of yourself at a bar with your friends. Casually run into what’s-her-name.

Go on a trip for the month of August. Sleep around. Congratulate yourself on your ability to live your life. Imagine her heart wilting in her own vase, next to the too-long-dead flowers you left her. Get off on how powerful you’ve become.

When you return and see she’s starting to move on, get wasted and send her a meaningless text. Crack open the door with your name on it she’s trying so hard to close. Use a sledgehammer if you have to. Remind her she’ll never move on. When she asks why you’re doing this to her, tell her you don’t know. Tell her you don’t deserve her. Tell her you just don’t love yourself enough to accept the love of someone else. Tell her what she wants to hear. Anything but the truth.

You died on a Tuesday.

I stood in that back room; the one by the nurses' station, their laughter seeping through the crack under the door. 

I cradled your little head in my hand. It was just like all those other times I did it. It felt the same; gravity mimicking the force with which you used to press yourself against me. 

Your right eye stayed open. The doctor mentioned that this sometimes happens. I assumed I shut the left with my palm without knowing, but the image was awkward and wrong.

You know the movie Men In Black? Go with me here. At one point they talk about a galaxy fitting inside of a small jewel and later we see the marble tied around a cat's neck. That left eye resembled the universe. I could see a galaxy looking back at me in the space where you once were.

An eternity passed but I left you there a few minutes later. The doctor told me they would take care of the rest. The nurses giggled next door.

I sit at my desk at work, and I go to the gym because they told me working out helped, and I sometimes buy kale at the supermarket because eating clean is good for the soul. This morning I drank a Bloody Mary at a bar on a cooler street than the one you used to live on. But a part of me is always going to be inside of that small room, staring at the vast emptiness of your face in an endless loop of forever. 

I don't know if heaven is real but it seems eternity exists in a cramped medical room surrounded by steel, the air thick with your still-close-enough soul.

You died on a Tuesday. But didn't you die just a minute ago? And the minute after that? Each morning you die again and seemingly always are and always were. You left me with your head pressed against my palm and the universe reflected in your eyes.