Cream

Sunlight is colder in the afternoon as I sip lukewarm coffee in a tiny gray room high above the rest of the world I look upon but can’t ever manage to fully understand. I hear his words in my head buzzing like one of those irritating hand held machines which hacks weeds to the ground and middle aged men can’t seem to put down on Sundays lest they, heaven forbid, be forced to actually stay in the house with the wife and kids as they claw their way through another day just the same as the last. But it’s tough and we’re punchy and who’s to really say we have deserved how far we’ve come in any case.

Sunshine trickles in through trees and though I’ve lost count of the days, I keep enough hope in my heart to sing to myself, even if what I sing is only the blues. I think of her with the wide eyes of an excitable creature and nipples like two ripe raspberries pointing through her thin white tee shirt. Somewhere back a few decades ago, she would sing for them in smokey night clubs while sipping on vodka and tonic, or whatever the thirsty bartender would slip her slim under aged ass.

She could feel them salivate, warm liquid honey dripping in response to some sultry song in that voice that was soft and low and just roughened up enough from the cigarettes to make them pulse quick in the chest and hard in their jeans.

You’re so pretty, baby, come on, sweetness, don’t be so mean.

The nights were every neon color swirled round and round into black until on one particular morning, in no particular month, in a season as long as the streets which lead to nowhere exceptional but call to her like sirens anyway, as a strong cut of light streaks in like a single intruding middle finger pressing through the smudged window pane and across her naked body, she realized none of it was coming back.

Not the joy or sorrow, not the ache or the thrill of catching something just to taste the hot sweet blood of the kill. Life moves forward even if you try to hang back. Still. Still she has the shiny salmon scars on her elbows and knees. She has her wooden cradle of secrets, and though they may seem like nothing to some, they are hers and hers alone to keep.