Michelle Tea - Black Wave

Her rectum fell out and I pushed it back in, Michelle’s mother repeated. There was a stiff pride in her voice. She knew she had been brave, had accepted an experience few would be able to handle. Michelle could hear her take a dry drag off her cigarette and it inspired Michelle to do the same.

I Still Don’t Understand What You’re Talking About, Michelle said, fearing her mother was trying to dramatically draw the story out. Michelle hated when people did that. She feared she actually did it all the time, was possibly doing it right now, as she typed the story of her mother and the fallen rectum onto her computer. She stubbed out her Camel in the empty ashtray then flung it out the window.

She strained and it fell out, Wendy said. She’s an old lady. She’s been living there since she was, I don’t know, before I started. I don’t even think she was crazy when they brought her in but she’s crazy now. Thirty, forty years she’s been there.

I Still Don’t Understand How Her Rectum Fell Out, Michelle maintained. How A Rectum Falls Out. A Rectum Is A Hole, How Does A Hole Fall Out Of Something, A Hole Is Nothing, It’s Negative, It’s Like — Michelle waved away her initial comparison of her vagina — It’s Like You’re Telling Me Someone’s Nostril Fell Out And You Pushed It Back In. It’s Negative Space, Please Tell Me What You Mean. Michelle shook her pack of cigarettes on the table and lit up a fresh one. Her mother heard the click of the lighter, the familiar crackle.

You smokin’? Wendy asked, alarmed. When did you start smokin’ again, I thought you quit? Are you stressed out, am I stressing you out? Wendy’s voice was thick with the accent of her region. There were no R s and words banged into each other awkwardly, like people not paying attention to their movements on a crowded street.

You Know, Michelle said airily, I Smoke, I Stop, I Smoke, I Stop.

You’re lucky , Wendy said wistfully. Your mother is like that too. I wish I could pick ’em up and put ’em down. She heard the familiar click and crackle, a smoker lighting up on the other side of the country. They each exhaled into their telephones.

Anyway. The Rectum.

You don’t understand biology, Wendy said. The rectum, the muscle around the hole, you strain it from, you know, pushing too hard, it can fall out of the body.

Michelle was glad to have a strong mind, one not prone to hypochondria, germ-phobia, or anxiety in general. Being raised by a nurse meant you were privy to all the tragedies that could befall a body. As a girl, Michelle would pour through her mother’s nursing-school textbooks. Terrible rashes sprawling across skin like a map. Parasites, slender monsters that could live inside your body. Athlete’s foot taken to extremes, cleft palates, birth defects. Diseases of the eyeballs and the gums. Mouth cancer. Elephantiasis of the gonads. Hemorrhoids the size of apricots, hung from the anus as if from a tree. Her brother, Kyle, couldn’t look at them — he had an anxiety disorder — but young Michelle enjoyed them, much as she enjoyed the B-grade horror movies shown on cable late at night. There was something so unreal about them, so extreme. But the older one becomes, the more it occurs to you that perhaps all these things are inevitable. Michelle felt less welcoming to the idea that one can lose one’s rectum. Your body is destined to fall apart, why not in this manner? Why not your rectum falling out? Does the rectum fall out of itself? Michelle still couldn’t wrap her mind around it. She imagined a long pink tube with a winking hole at the end sliding from a body, like a grisly penis or one of those water-snake balloon toys kids give hand jobs to. She shuddered.

The CNAs were freaking out about it, Wendy said . Oh, call the doctor, call the doctor. I said, for what, that? I’ll do it. I just put on some gloves and pushed it back inside. She was fine, the poor thing.

That’s Amazing, Michelle said. You Are Amazing. I Hope You Get A Raise For That.

Mom snorted. Michelle imagined dragon gusts of smoke blowing from her nostrils. Oh, don’t write that, she thought. Wendy hates looking so smoky in these stories. Michelle questioned her desire to make her mom look rough. But the woman spent her days returning fallen rectums and smoking cigarettes. I’m not making this up, Michelle pouted.

A raise? Not likely, Wendy said bitterly. Not in that shit hole. They give the manager raise after raise and they’re hiring these RNs with no experience, these kids.

Why Don’t You Go Back To School, Ma?

I’m too old, I can’t deal with that. Plus, I don’t want to be like them.

Like Who?

The RNs. They all think they’re hot shit. My supervisor likes me though. He’s nice. Young. Reminds me of your brother.

He’s Gay?

Flaming.

Okay, Can You Tell Me What I Have To Do To Make Sure My Rectum Never Falls Out? she asked.

Oh, it only really happens to old people.

Well, I’ll Be Old Someday, What Should I Do?

Don’t strain. You should never strain anyway, it gives you hemorrhoids.

Didn’t Elvis Die From Straining?

He had a heart attack. He was on dope, don’t be a dopehead and you’ll be fine. How’s Los Angeles?

It’s Good.

Michelle looked around the apartment. The apartment was too small and smelled weird. The wall-to-wall carpeting was suspiciously stiff, like something had been spilled across it, mashed into the fibers, and allowed to dry into a crunchy board. It felt creepy on her bare feet. It was a charcoal-colored carpet that Michelle feared was supposed to be some other color. Like, white.

How’s your friend? Michelle’s mother extended the conversation. Michelle couldn’t tell if it was cute or made her crazy that her lesbian moms referred to her dates as friends . They referred to one another that way, too. Michelle chalked it up to their place and time. It was hard to be mad at her parents for their homophobia when they were gay, too.

My Friend? Michelle asked. Do You Mean Quinn Or Lu?

I don’t know, Wendy laughed nervously. Not for nothin’ I can’t keep them straight with you.

Michelle couldn’t remember which version of the story she was in. Was It A Teenager Or A Married Woman?

Oh Jesus, Wendy said. Are you kiddin’ me? Don’t you want a real relationship with someone? What are you doing, a teenager? How old? You can get arrested, you know. That’s statutory rape and they won’t care that you’re a lesbian. Lesbians can be rapists too.

She Was Nineteen, Michelle said.

And a married woman! Marriage is a sacrament. You have to think about a person who is not true to her word like that, what kind of character she has.

Ma, Michelle said, You Know You Were Excommunicated From The Church Like A Million Times Over For Being Gay.

It’s between me and my god, Wendy said staunchly. God doesn’t care who we love, only that we keep our promises. What makes you think that woman will keep a promise to you when she didn’t keep her promise to her husband?

They’re Both Gone Anyway, Michelle said. I Took Them Out Of The Story. I’m Just Going To Be Alone. It’s Easier.

Wendy exhaled a worried cloud of smoke. I don’t like you living alone in that city.

Kyle’s Here, Michelle said.

Why don’t you live with him? Wendy suggested.

Michelle thought about it on the level of a plot twist. It would be interesting. But having Michelle move in with Kyle would require Michelle to rewrite the last two hundred pages, rather than just edit extensively, and writing was exhausting.