i sat down on the bench at the bus stop on 24th and 3rd, next to a girl with a black long sleeve tshirt on in 93 degree sticky august weather. she looked about 17 years old, not much younger than i. i noticed her small, elegant fingers holding onto a black leather sketchbook and i found myself yearning to know what was inside of it.
i looked at her and smiled, commented on the weather;
"i would be sweating buckets if i were wearing that shirt."
she looked at me with such repugnance, it was as if i had told her that i killed her puppy and ate it for breakfast.
i looked away into the distance and watched the hustle and bustle of new york city on a tuesday. i held my gaze on a window of a large office building, 17 stories up and 4 across from the left. i imagined the cubicles; small, cramped and disgustingly humid, and the people inside of them; lonely, fed up and hungry.
"i would love to not be wearing this shirt. unfortunately my skin isn't pure and unmarked like yours."
the girl stood up, and looked at me with such sadness in her eyes that i could not unsee them. she walked down 24th towards the subway. she left her leather sketchbook sitting beside me, an unopened treasure chest full of unknown secrets and dreams.
i watched the girl walk with her arms crossed, bag thrown over one shoulder down the street, expecting her to turn around realizing what she had left behind - but she didn't. she kept walking and walking and walking until i could not longer see anything more than a small black dot.
i was brought back when i heard the large bus screech and halt to a stop, the black woman driving stare at me as if she had been waiting three and a half years for me to get on the bus. i picked up the black sketchbook and climbed the steps, popping $2.75 into the fare box.
i sat down in an empty middle seat, and leaned my head against the hot window. i felt the sun beam down on my face through the plexi-glass as i looked down at the black leather sketchbook still in my hands. i found myself holding it as if it were a very important document given to me by a secret agent to bring to the CIA.
i made it home to my stuffy one bedroom apartment with the sketchbook still unopened, still in careful hands. i set it down on my kitchen counter beside my yellow sticky note to pick up eggs, ketchup and lemon juice. which i forgot. again. i stared at the beautiful black leather of the sketchbook for a good ten minutes before finally flipping the cover to reveal two words, written with pencil in the most beautiful calligraphy i have ever seen;
"tragically beautiful"
i was so taken aback by the juxtaposition of these two simple words that i wished i had never opened the book at all, but somehow i felt myself flipping page after page looking at sketches drawn by an amazing talent whom i don't even know the name of.
i sat down at my desk after analyzing each and every sketch and put a fresh piece of paper into my typewriter. i entitled it
"tragically beautiful.

scars do not make an individual beautiful. scars simply add to the tragedy of the beauty shown by that individual. tragedy and beauty are two things that can not seem to be more opposed to each other, but somehow they can not exist without one another."

i wanted so desperately to know how to reach this girl, and tell her to wear her smallest tank top. i wanted her to know that her scars did not have to be covered up by unforgiving cotton. i wanted her to realize that her tragedies don't define her beauty.
her sketchbook is still beside my typewriter, bringing me back to that day on the bench.
if only she knew how impure and marked up my skin really is, that would truly be,
tragically beautiful.