A Story

She wanted an escape but she wasn’t sure where to look for it. Her mother had suggested Germany. She thought about that then kicked a hole in her wall. Or did that conversation happen before the hole? It was probably before. But the hole was still in the wall and her dad wasn’t there anymore to fix it. A hole. A cavernous hole. The outline resembled her black converse shoes but lacked the warm, orange comfort they radiated.

She thought back to that day. It was before the hole, before Germany, before the excessive sex, and before April. That day she was in the hospital. Sitting in, well- sitting in a cold chair with a hole in it. A hole, an insignificant hole. How ironic. Was it ironic? What was the definition of irony? She needed a dictionary. She asked for one. They didn’t have one.

“Dying people don’t need anything except flowers and clean sheets.”

Oh.

“They don’t need vocabulary. They are going to a place that’s beyond words.”

Yeah right.

She still didn’t know what she thought about God. Whatever. Ashes to, well- nothing. Okay. Back to… to?

She thought back, was the chair metal? Yeah. Silver, cold, slimy metal. Wait, a chair couldn’t be slimy. It was just vomit her hand was in then. Okay. That was okay. She could wash her hands later. Now was not the time. Her fingers felt around. Her bones felt around. Her mind felt around. And they all concluded that there was definitely a hole in her chair. Wonderful.

She supposed the hole was supposed to be in the chair. Because the chair was metal and her dad had told her that metal doesn’t just spontaneously become porous.

That was back when he had had words, when there was a dictionary nearby.

So the hole was like a design then. No, not like, it was just simply that: a design. Still, why would a chair maker put a hole in his work? But it wasn’t the time for that train of thought so she moved on. She thought about that Emily Dickenson poem, and wished there was a fly to distract her. She wished her life was a stream of consciousness; that technique wasn’t Dickenson’s, it was Faulkner’s. But that’s where her mind had wondered so...

She looked at her lap. There was a journal and a pen: a black, midnight-flowing, word-flowing, incomprehensible pen. It opened its gaping mouth and talked to her, offered her comfort.

No, that’s ridiculous, pens don’t speak. Dads do. Dads need dictionaries, Dads need mouths, Dads need words. Not pens, they don’t need that stuff. Whatever. She could ignore her pen for now.

There were things she should be doing. Right? Her dad was lying on his deathbed and all she could think about was how much she wanted her pen to shut it. Where was that damn dictionary-less nurse? Damnit, focus. There were only seconds left and she knew it. It was supposed to hurt. Or maybe it did. Did it? She couldn’t think. And the heart monitor kept ticking his life away. And the oxygen fed him and it was so loud. SO DAMN LOUD. She couldn’t concentrate. It was too much. It was too fucking much. Help her. GODDAMNIT HELP HER! HELP HIM. FUCK! FUCK!

She thought she was babbling or blubbering. If she had had a dictionary she would have known which word to use. But thinking back maybe she wasn’t doing either.

She looked around. The memory was so real. But she couldn’t hear his heart monitor so yes, she was at home, not at the hospital.

She needed to go. Now. Right fucking now. To school? To Mark’s? Where? Because it wasn’t safe in her house. That fucking hole was taking over. It was eating her life, it was consuming her bed. It had started sucking her in at night. But it would spit her out in the morning so it wasn’t like she was stuck. It was like a Venus Fly Trap with no digestion system. But it wasn’t green. It was black.

She had to focus but she couldn’t. Her mind was in fragments and she was in Germany. Wait, no, she wasn’t. She would feel better if she was in Germany.

“FOCUS,” she told herself, “You are at home . HOME.”

She looked around. She was in the hole. Weird. She had really thought-

She had to get out of bed before the hole decided to spit her out. Because she had to fix it eventually. Without her dad, ya know? She didn’t know a contractor. Plus it couldn’t be that hard. Just put up some drywall and paint it white. Simple, just a patch-up.

She started to laugh, hysterically. HAHAHA! HA! It was mania, and it was wonderful. Pure. So tasty. So perfect. Just bliss. Then down. Down, down, down. Into a deep hole. Wait, that was silly. She couldn’t think about a metaphorical hole if she was in a literal hole. Her face, her beautiful flawless face scrunched up.

OKAY. No more laughing. She swung her feet down and sat upright. Her blankets were everywhere and the drool on her pillow was not yet cold. Her hair was like Medusa’s and her hands could heal. They could.

She stood up.

Inside the hole it was cold. Like marble. She bent down and put her check on the ground. Her tongue seized. Still, she had no need to talk, no need for a dictionary. The hole was round, and safe. The walls were so high. And there were flowers. She could smell them. There was no white light and her dad was still gone and it wasn’t Germany. But, maybe that would all change here. So she lay down and hoped for the daisies to consume her like they had Alice. And they did. And she saw white. And Germany. And her dad.

And she was calm.
And her soul could rest.

She would not kick another hole. But she wouldn’t fix this one either. It belonged to her now. She understood it. She owned this feeling. She could- what did they say- live one day at a time. Yeah. She could.