Dear Eloise
I’m staring at the family of Chinese girls, the mom appears to be the same age as her kids. If you lined them up they’re the same style of person. The space between their eyes match, their hair is all black, oiled and pressed very straight. They all have exposed shoulder skin, denim, red pop colors, slide on rubber shoes over white socks. When I first arrived, the mom was eating from a bowl she brought close up to her mouth. The girls were sucking on their teeth and moving their heads around, focusing at people randomly around the room. I see a man in workout clothing always a few feet away, looking at his phone and never looking up. Every few minutes, he makes a noise or says a word I can never hear clearly. I only register that he made a noise. Short words, abrupt, and nobody reacts except me.
The prettiest of the girls runs her hands through her hair and pushes her chin forward. The mom motions towards the door, they all stand up at the same time without saying a word and shuffle away.
Where I was sitting, I had a good view of the office. Men and Women came here, both serviced equally and nobody seemed to care about what you ordered. I’ve been having trouble remembering the days clearly, and in this moment I can’t remember if I’ve placed my order yet. A man with a very red face carrying a white spray bottle is spraying and wiping down the empty tables, repositioning the chairs and picking bits of paper off the floor.
Your problem isn’t your beauty. Whenever I watch your face work, I see the matrix of muscles that grew inside you. Your mouth moves while you blink, your chest is going up on an inhale, both of your eyes are focusing at me. All of this happens now, and that’s not magic it’s nature, and it’s not even yours. It’s borrowed, like putting money down. It’s the system we’re given, and here I am watching your nature.
Eloise, I don’t think your beauty is a hole - I know this because, I think you can measure someone according to their instincts. I see when you let yourself slide out in public, I see you change when your shadow is different but you haven’t done anything, look I’m trying to stay focused on you, and not this weird office. My mouth tastes like honey from an hour ago, I’ve been removing food groups from my diet one at a time. All I have now is coffee, and honey. The simple things sustaining my nature are being reflected back at you.
I would do anything for you.
In nature, a syntax error is how you describe a wounded animal. Glitchy code, misfiring, misaligning - the stuff you memorized and followed from when you were little is the same shit that’s making you like this. The inherited parts are full of inconsistencies and gaps. Like this book, that you’re reading. Pages ripped out but you’d never know it. There are hiccups in the planning and emotional programming of us. Misinterpreting love as pain and kindness as weakness, good friends have holes too and should be used. Everyone is invited to feel good, I imagine this is the ultimate and final boss of us. The pain source is what gets us both off. We put our mouths together. Yours lips are dry but mine are too because instead of snow here we all just dry out slowly, cracked laughing, drinking coffee, and bleeding in the seventy-five degree winter.
Your mouth can bleed from laughing just like your mouth can bleed from having it beaten with a hammer. Dry lips are broken lips, I like cuts that open without anyone touching them. Your skin just opens up.
The room is quiet, the tables are clean. The receptionist is the last person here with me. I approach her and she doesn’t look up until I speak.
“Hey, I’m just checking on my appointment.”
“What’s your name?”
“- - - - — - - - - — “
She types it in, and without looking at me tells me I don’t have an appointment. I never made one, she asks if I’d like to make an appointment. I tell her yes, and she says they have availabilities at 2am, 3am, and 6:45am.
“What time is it right now?”
“1am.”
I look around the room waiting around in the socially acceptable amount of time I had to respond to her, before it got weird. A yellow cat clock with the arms that move, it looked Chinese. The calendar in Chinese letters. A picture of a waterfall with light coming thru it. A red backpack on a black chair.
“I’ll take the 6:45am”
She didn’t answer, she typed in the computer without looking at me.
“Ok, we’ll see you then.”
I walked down the single flight of stairs back to the street and thought about you, a little more. What time was it in Belfast, what were you doing with your day. I imagined you eating a piece of cream pie, with your mouth and soft body. I thought about your tits - I have the two photos you sent me, one tits out, one covered up. I animate you by swiping, I zoom in on the corner where your hand is delicately pulling away the strap to your panties. I focus on the skin not touching anything, that’s bare and free. I bring you to life in the bedroom of my brain. I’m standing at the door to the street but I haven’t opened it, I’m listening to how quiet it is. There’s a low white noise coming from the city at the opposite side to the door, but I’m not ready for that yet. What time is it in Belfast?
I get outside, cross the street and get into my car. Once in my car I look at my phone for twenty minutes before driving anywhere. The headlights turn on automatically, and I sit there, just accumulating something.