Chelsea Martin - Everything Was Fine Until Whatever

He said, “Well maybe I didn’t mean that.”

So I laughed at whatever he said. I laughed so hard I started crying, so I excused myself to the ladies’ room and applied more makeup.

He said, “Someone as beautiful as you could never really love me.”

So I smudged my makeup a little to make him more comfortable.

He said,“This all seems too painless to be real love.”

So I stood up and demanded to know why he was home so late the night before.

He said, “I like where this is going.”

So I made jealous comments about his ex-girlfriends and demanded that he reenact our first telephone conversation. When he couldn’t remember the correct sequence of our conversation, I accused him of cheating on me. I ordered a bouquet of flowers online, had them delivered to myself, and made JR believe they were from another man.

He said, “I think I’m really starting to fall for you.”

So I got drunk and hacked into his email account and got upset about year-old emails from other girls and then cried myself to sleep.

He said, “Now I feel left out.”

So I begged him never to leave me.

He said, “Just a little less desperate and a little more playful.”

So I tattooed his name onto my right breast and posted a photo of it on the Internet.

He said, “That would work really well as an action shot, don’t you think?”

So I let him suckle my nipple for the last two minutes while I uploaded the new picture. I titled it ‘Please don’t let this end so it can never begin again.’

He said, “Can I see you again? Can I call you?” and discreetly put fifty dollars on the table. I pretended not to notice what he did.

I looked at him as if to say, “Where’s my cash?”

He waited for me to pick the money up. The way I saw it was; I’m his employee, and he’s my boss. I shouldn’t have to remind him to pay me. He shouldn’t be able to be so indirect. He gestured subtly toward the money, and I was careful not to follow his gaze. I wasn’t going to let him win that easily.

Kate is dying. She is getting close to death. Her houseguest, an Internet stranger named Ira, who has arranged to sleep on her couch for the next four days through an online social network catering to travelers, is halfway on the sidewalk and halfway on the street in a strange town, and he is watching her die.

“Kate,” he thinks, but then his thought just ends. They met less than an hour ago. They were on bicycles. He thinks this is just perfect.

He doesn’t know much about her. They had dropped his things off at her apartment and were on their way to get a few groceries. He is traveling through the states. He has recently been dumped by a girlfriend and is determined to find himself. He sublet his apartment in Detroit to a couple of his ex-girlfriend’s close friends. He wonders now if that was a good idea.

It is a powerful image for Ira, Kate lying here, her unfamiliar stomach fat drooping over her pants unpleasantly. It’s like live reality television.

Kate’s apartment was messy when they stopped in. Things were dirty, and the place had a certain monotonous quality. The couch appeared to be woven with itchy synthetics, had a sick-looking orange cat sitting on it, and was generally unappealing.

Kate’s voice, if he can recall, is deep but cheerful. She’s friendly and enthusiastic, but entirely unattractive. Her face is too complex to be beautiful. The lines around her nose and between her eyebrows are deep and unmistakable. When they met, he immediately abandoned the sexual agenda he had been, in three short emails, pretending not to have, and began hoping that she hadn’t had one. It’s supposed to be innocent, travelers helping travelers. But Ira hasn’t had sex in four months and to him, everyone was a possibility.

He tries to look helpful. He uses his cell phone. He waves down drivers. His efforts are dutiful and attentive. There are no frantic memories flashing through his mind, and he gives no passionate cries for help. He is thinking clearly and is satisfied with himself for that.

Kate’s blood is on the ground. It is moving in circles.

“It isn’t possible to live without blood,” Ira thinks.

He has never hugged her, so it doesn’t occur to him that this is the same blood that would’ve made any such hugs warm. As Kate moves closer to death, Ira feels himself becoming alone and stranded, sees himself standing on the black concrete uselessly, a lone parasite that has found himself without a host, staring blankly at the pending corpse of what was once an abstract sexual fantasy. He sees the thoughts in his head as if they were lines of an instant message:

(3:46pm)Does the world know it doesn’t need me?

(3:46pm)It does, it definitely does.

(3:46pm)Maybe the world needs me. It’s possible, I think. Is it?

(3:47pm)It doesn’t. It’s not. No.

He briefly wonders if it would be appropriate to get the keys from her pocket and go back to her apartment once the paramedics get here and take her away with them. Keep to the itinerary despite the unexpected tragedy. But Kate has a roommate, Ira knows, and he wouldn’t want to have to explain anything to her. The roommate would be overemotional and cry, probably. She would be confused and unsure about Ira sleeping there and distressed by his graphic and technical account of the accident. She would silently disapprove when he decided to sleep on her bed instead of the couch.

Kate’s fingers shakily form a fist and then uncurl.

“Was that it?” Ira thinks, but he sees that she is still breathing, gently and sporadically

What’s the point of having sex organs when my main purpose in life is to write unemotional poems using full sentences?

I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking I shouldn’t work in customer service.

I’m at the point in my life where I wake up in the morning and literally don’t know what to do.

My mom says this feeling is my hormones telling me to have children, but it feels more like my hormones telling me to buy the Goosebumps series books on eBay.

The most emotional sexual experience I ever had involved a hallucination of someone I loved being in the same room while I gave someone else I loved a handjob.

But that seems strange because I’m pretty sure I’ve never loved anyone.

I’m at the point in my life where I masturbate to memories of cuddling.

My mom says there are some things she really doesn’t need to know.

I hope it’s okay that I’m not referring to all the text messages I’ve received while writing this.

I try to drink coffee and look out of windows but eventually I have to crap or blink.

I grew up poor and everyone who grew up poor has a somewhat decent sense of humor.

I have complex fears stemming from childhood that I don’t want to talk about right now.

When I was twelve someone bought me a case of SoBe and I felt rich and powerful. Ever since then my sense of humor has been confusing and aggressive.

Now I’m writing poetry because I’m beginning to feel serious about life.