by Kira Coleman
Doubts
There are nights when I stand under the
shower head feeling the hot water expand
my hair and wondering if you knew what
you were doing, if anyone had explained
to you what rape is or why it’s bad, if
maybe somebody in your life had told you
that if your girlfriend isn’t putting out, you
have to take action.
I remember my uncomfortable little laughs
when you said that one couple who always
paused making out on the grass in front of
the school to say hi to us must be having
sex, that dating for too long without it was
a bad sign. When you said that our friends
who weren’t probably weren’t really
in love.
When I told my dad years after the fact, he
said that what you did was clearly wrong because
we’d never had sex before. I tried frantically
to remember if I’d let you touch me through
my pants in your car in the Whole Foods
parking lot before or after I’d woken up to
your fingers inside me, wondering if somehow
you’d really thought it was okay or
romantic.
But then I remember that if you’d thought it
was okay, if you’d really believed I wanted
your fingers there, you wouldn’t have had to
wait until I fell asleep, wouldn’t have had to
make me promise not to hold one mistake
against you, to threaten me with the idea
of being an unforgiving type of person, to
wipe the tears off of my face and make me
swear I’d never mention it again.
Tergiversation & My Mother
What didn’t happen was Cody from next door
when I was ten and he was fourteen.
But anyways, when my brother was potty training
he liked to grin and admit that the wet spots on the
carpet came from his penis. I didn’t have a penis,
but whatever I did have was a bad word.
My mom got mad a lot. Once when we were kids,
she stormed into the room and pulled the blanket
off of my brother and me. When she didn’t find what
she was looking for, she walked out in silence.
We didn’t know what she was looking for.
She yelled at me for letting Cody from next door in
to the basement when she wasn’t home. I just didn’t
want to be rude. She didn’t believe me that he didn’t
“do anything”.
I didn’t know what she thought he might have done.
What did happen was falling asleep during the movie
and waking up to dirty fingers inside me
when my boyfriend and I were both seventeen.
My mom wanted to know what I did that made him think
he could do that.
I don’t think I even knew that he could do that.
All You Need to Know
My dad’s fifth grade teacher once threw him
over three rows of desks because he wouldn’t stop
reading in class. As a kid, this was one of my
favorite stories and one that I didn’t understand
him refusing to tell when I asked him to at
dinner parties.
In college I sometimes told stories that felt
relevant and didn’t realize they were fucked up
until they’d already made it out of my mouth and
nobody laughed. Like me at two years old spending
hours upon hours laying out my dad’s books on
the living room couch and then “buying” them
and returning them to their places on the
bookshelves.
Last night when you said you’re not sure how
best to sit on a giant sectional, I bit my
tongue on my first thought, which was that I
was raped on a giant sectional. And then I
just kept thinking about it because I
didn’t say it, and having to hold it in felt
heavy.
And that’s probably all you need to know
about me.