graphic by kayleigh woltal
i can’t remember how i ended up here but i’m glad i did. i loved the faint taste of salt on my tongue mid-summer and the way i felt so insignificant when i looked at the stars hovering just out of reach, forbidden fireflies. the management was terrible a lot of the time – power like porcelain in careless hands, crushed to powder and divided with monopoly money. but i brushed shoulders and swallowed back laughter like syrup and dragged my fingertips through wet paint, i knew what it was to be free. i felt every emotion at once rolling through my veins, sugar sweet cavities in my bones suddenly filled with candy floss promises. there was enough pain to fill a ravine. a deep ache that feels almost hollow, one that gnaws and demands to be fed with searing shame. i came to understand what it was to be full, the kind of full where your skin feels swollen and stretched over taut flesh. somehow in the end it was worth it – raw skin and splintered earth beautiful under a sun which sends gold flecks across bare shoulders, a moon which leaves milky pearls glistening under rough waters. five stars. i’m not sure if i would return.