i’m 13 and my first kiss is from a boy named nick behind ****’s sporting goods in stale street air. nick’s canadian and when i ask if he can speak french he says no but I can play hockey and that is the next best thing

a week prior when i tell lauren we’ve been dating seven months and haven’t kissed yet she can’t believe it but all i believe is i’m 13 and a first kiss was supposed to be so special
so special i am too scared to close my eyes so my first kiss is a waterfront view of spider-leg eyelashes, too much spit, and all nick.

two weeks later he calls me cherry and i call him kiwi because we think normal pet names are too mainstream.

three weeks later nick breaks up with me when i corner him by the west wing lockers in the middle school by english class. i confront him, lay out the facts, and that is that.
  
i’m 14 and my second kiss is by the bleachers at the high school football game – not behind because behind the bleachers is where kids go for second base and to form ****** lips around leaf sweet smoke.
i‘m 14 and my second kiss is still nick but it’s not all spit and i wonder who he’s been kissing
i’m 14 and my second kiss is to the melody of a collective crowd’s stamping feet and a boy named jared with no real teeth wolf-whistling at us from the corner  
i’m 14 and i remember to close my eyes  

i’m 15 and grind on levi who’s twice my height to a rihanna song at homecoming
his crotch is against my upper back when it should be against my ***
he doesn’t kiss me, drops me off, speeds away in his oldsmobile

i’m 17 and my first **** is with a man named dan who serves at the same restaurant i smile at and hand menus out for tips. i’m his twenty-third and for a while after 23 is my favorite number
i’m 17 and i’m bleeding on dan’s brother’s sheets
i’m 17 and afterwards dan sleeps with a girl named stephanie who probably ***** better than me. i got my ears pierced at claire's last year but stephanie has tattoos between her **** and a dermal.

i’m 20 and barely flinch when i see nick at the local community college. i ask if he still plays hockey and he asks me what good books i’ve read lately and i wonder if he’s any good in bed.

i’m 22 and i’ve laid with a dozen men, all nestled like eggs in my crate of shame

i’m 22 and i've learned to close my eyes until they've finished with me

she ties her ******* thick knot so he can’t **** on it.
she bites the inside of her cheek until she tastes rust, until he finishes and collapses in a post-****** nap.
she is forced to rise after her body’s beating, juggle his child, do the dishes, start boiling the water, prepare his dinner, crack open a beer, unscrew the anti-freeze and pour just enough all with one hand and all before he wakes.
he tells her to sweep the floor but the dust pads her footsteps so she doesn’t wake him and she’s happiest when he’s asleep.
he’s happiest when he has something to complain about, something to force himself into, some cavity to cram in the name of pleasure.  

women are wild horses grazing in forgotten fields, unrequited and unchained beauty admired only by the sun.
women are the lone wolves, leading from behind.
women are the taste of freedom ****** out by a man with hands around her neck and hot breath in her ear asking if she likes it, asking if she wants it harder.
women are the smell of iron and sticky fingerprints, painting red-black odes into cotton canvases, where society can’t stipple or staunch the flow of freedom.
women are mothers before birth to unruly grab-me-a-beer-babe men tossing ***** clothes to a fresh mopped floor and telling her the place is a pit.
women are anger buried beneath flesh, a bubbling riot up and out of their mouths in the form of what they call crazy and what we call just plain tired.

she hands him his beer, smiles as she adjusts the baby.
here, she says, you deserved it.
she tastes those words, the way they weigh heavily on her tongue like stones tossed into a lake to drown.
she tastes those words, the same words he said to her the first time he painted her eye a pretty bruise-blue, pulled her hair like reigns like he actually believed he could control how she built herself.

i accidentally threw my toothbrush away last night and had to use the spare i’ve been saving for you
my eyeglasses had a water droplet on them and i couldn’t see straight it wasn’t because i was drunk
or sad
or angry
it was the water droplet blurring everything and bringing an end to fine edges and clarity answers

in the end it is kindness that undoes me
my dog brings me toys when i'm sad or sick and nudges them into my elbow like some knock-off substitution for benadryl or lexapro
i still have sand in my eyes from the desert you drug me through
it isn’t because i haven’t slept  
or am hungover
or dehydrated
i swear it's the sand like diamonds

whenever i'm in the throes of a panic attack i wear the shirt my mom bought me because it makes me feel safe
the day after you i ask her if i'm allowed to tell her when i'm hungover or when i've made a mistake
but i can't because when you moved over me and my body responded
it wasn’t my mom's shirt anymore.
it was yours

your version of love is an algorithm more basic than take-aways. you're allowed to take as much as you give and you still get a solid number. a real result. but i don't work in binaries and black-and-whites.

love is my negative number and the missing letter to my typewriter i can't find no matter which dusty beasts i search through. it's the bruise on the heel of my palm as i collide with secrets -- swiping hands beneath your sofa searching for my missing key.  

love is your receipt.
here's what you bought, here's what it cost.

i'll register bankruptcy instead. take my seven years and start over instead of being your negative number and unknown variable. a declined credit card stamped on your list of positive transactions.

i’m wearing malbec lipstick at 330 in the afternoon, my own personal hue that stains lips and teeth, drips down my chin so a tongue flicks out to savor the drop. it leaves a maroon trace like i’ve been ******* blood.
when i swill the wine, it captivates me. like i'm swishing around my own blood, praying enough of it sloshes out to **** me.
i’m headed to catholic church in an hour, maybe i’ll light a candle for myself.
god knows i ******* need it.
i’m at that delicate lining, the in-between stage of the five stages of grief. the soft spot at the base of my skull. self-destruct button that’s so tempting, nestled between anger and depression. skip bargaining. take a trip around the sun.
i've lost my hair tie and i want it back.
i've lost my heart and i want it back. ******* give it back.
reapply mauve lipstick the flavor of malbec. go to church. rinse the good off when you get home.
i still feel him inside of me. taking everything. claiming it as his own, two hundred and fifty-eight hours later. like he’s stained me and now i'm tainted and unapproachable. undesirable.
piece of plastic wrap that used to keep his heart fresh, now i'm trash.
now i’m his.

when you go through something trying all the good guys and do-gooders flock to you. they wring metaphorical hands and ask if there's anything they can do, like some baked ziti or wadded handkerchief will caulk your cracks.
then an acceptable timetable for healing goes by and they lay pity eyes on you give you that how're you doing honey smile, but their baked ziti didn't serve as the salve they'd hoped and you're crumbling fast and maybe that pity smile is your solution so you tell them.
you tell them how many times you count the cracks in your ceiling before falling asleep (27) you tell them how many glasses of wine it takes to feel decent again (at least 4) you tell them how many hours it's been since you last ate (56)
and they wish you ate the ******* ziti and blew your nose in damp handkerchiefs because an acceptable amount of time has passed and you should be healed by now, but what they don't know is your timetable is inverted and you work in wrong-way highways. they don't know that time is scar tissue much more delicate than the lock-box you've put him and all the things he did in, and each second chips away at that box and the essence of him is seeping out like acid that melts through all your barriers.
the good guys and do-gooders don't want to open your broken-heart bank and let all the bees out. they want you to eat the ziti and say thank you like it actually fixed something.

I came across a BMW 528i today -- same make and model as yours, same rusty maroon clunk ******* you drove so proud. Could’ve been yours, with its cracked leather and yellow stuffing vomiting from seat to the floor, steering wheel worn from your callouses. High school football team kind of callouses, country boy livin' kind of callouses. Inverted smile, dimpled chin, kind brown eyes kind of callouses. Take a girl like me on a 4-wheeler and make her scream middle of a Sunday kind of callouses. Raise in surprise as headlights blind you in Charleston kind of callouses. Lay limp with pavement shot through your skull and bone shards in your leg kind of callouses. Some drunk kid driver says just some ****** drunk kid crossing the street, came out of ****** nowhere. You were some drunk kid, but you had the right of way, and how couldn’t he see you? You brought the light wherever you went, drunk kid, and now you're ICU comatose-kid, and thousands of us are thinking about you back home. Drunk kid, high school football star kind of kid, just out for a drink kind of kid. Likes his cars like his women – flashy, look past the maintenance kind of kid. But your girl’s back home projectile vomiting yellow body stuffing through leather ****** lips, and your 528i is somebody else’s, and they didn’t appreciate it like you did, kid. It's just sittin’ in the street, and you’re just lost. Some kind of hospital kid.