Mercy (63 page)

porcelain o f his teeth, there’s the edge o f his teeth on my

nipple, and he’s got my underpants torn o ff me and m y legs

pushed up and spread and he’s in me and I think I will count to

a hundred and it will be over but it isn’t, he’s different, I try to

push him o ff and he raises him self above me and he smiles at

me and he pushes me back, he holds me down, and I give up, I

do, I stay still, m y body dies as much as it can, hate distilled, a

perfect hate expressed in a perfect physical passivity, a perfect

attentiveness to dying, he’s going to say I’m a bad lay because I

w on ’t move but I hate him and I w on’t move. I just wait now

for him to come but he’s different, he w on’t come, he pushes

m y neck to hurt it and he kisses me, I feel his mouth on me,

he’s in me, sudden, brutal, unpleasant; vomitous; then he’s out

o f me, he’s kissing me, he kisses me everywhere, he rams into

me then he’s out, he’s kissing, he’s kissing my stomach, he’s

kissing m y legs, then he’s in me and m y thighs are pushed back

past m y shoulders, then he’s kissing me, he’s kissing m y anus

and licking it and he’s kissing my legs and he’s talking to me,

your skin reminds me o f Bridget’s, he says, Bridget has

beautiful skin, some whispering bullshit like I’m his lover or

his friend or something, conspiring with him, and then he’s

ramming him self in me and then he’s kissing me and I am

confused and afraid and I am paralyzed, I don’t move, I don’t

want to move, I w on’t move but also I can’t move, hate pins

me there flat, still, a perfect passivity, I think I am physically

real but my body’s incoherent to my own mind because I can’t

follow what he’s doing to me or what he wants, he’s doing it

to me but I don’t know what it is, there’s no organizing

principle, there’s no momentum or logic, I’m desperate for an

end but there’s no end, he’s brutal and cold and chaotic and I

say this will end but it doesn’t end, he rams, he kisses, I say this

is real, I am real, surely I am real, the physical reality is

overw helm ingly brutal and nasty, he tempers it, he thinks,

with these kisses, each one must be washed off, gotten off,

later, the skin must be gotten o ff later, gotten rid of, the cells

must be scraped off, I will need new skin, clean skin, because

he is expectorating all over me, I will need to rub and scrape, I

can use a knife or a stone, I’ll scrape it off, he’s in me, then he

withdraws, then he kisses, he kisses m y stomach, he kisses m y

feet— m y feet; he kisses m y legs, I feel a searing pain in m y leg,

I feel a terrible bad pain, I feel sharp shots o f pain, then he

rams, he kisses, he pushes, he pushes m y legs apart, he pushes

them back, he rams, he kisses, he must o f read a book, girls

like this, girls like that, you kiss girls, you kiss them; you kiss

them; he’s kissing me and saying things as if we are friends or I

know him or something and then he rams in, brutal bastard,

and then he’s a lover, kissing; and this is m y body but it ain’t, I

say it ain’t, I say it ain’t, I say I ain’t here and it ain’t me; but

time’s real
— time is real
— time’s real; there’s a long time until

dawn, there’s a couple o f hours until six and then there’s

m aybe an hour after that until there’s real light, you know,

sun, sun coming down from the sky, sun filtering down

through the cold, sun traveling down; heating up, even a little,

the streets, stone cold, steel-like daggers, the slab they lay you

out on; m y slab, a stone cold street; and a girl who wants to

live, such a girl, a girl who fucking wants to live doesn’t go out

until dawn, can’t go out until dawn; girls don’t go out at night;

girls who want to live don’t go out at night; you need light to

go out; you need sun; you need daylight; you need it to be a

little warmer, you need the edge o ff the cold, you need the

wind warmed up a little, you need it pale out, not dark, you

need it yellow or yellowish or even a flat silver or gray, a dull

gray, you need it gray or grayish or a dirty white at least, you

need it ash or a pale, pale blue as if it’s got a wash over it, a

watercolor wash, a greenish hue, or you need it to be pink, a

pinkish color, you need it pink, a little pink and a little warm ,

pinkish and warmish, you need light, you need light that’s

fresh and new, wholesome, washed in a subtle pastel color, a

pale hue, you need real light, honest light, well-established

light, not half dark, not stained by dark, not transitory or

illusory, you need it yellow from sun or even silver or gray,

you need it heated up, cozy, as if someone lit a match and

burned it to heat up the air, you need the sun m ixing with the

wind, a touch o f heat, you need it to be daytime if you’re a girl

so you can be safe and warm and at night you have to stay

inside so you w on’t get hurt; you don’t go out after dark; you

stay inside at night, you don’t be stupid and fuck up or some

stranger could hurt you, some bad man, a Nazi or some ghoul.

Y ou got to stay inside and if there’s a boy who likes you he’ll

sit next to you and he’ll kiss you and you can just stay with

him. Paul’s asleep. H e’s pinning me down, half on top o f me, a

lover but slightly displaced, half on me, half on the bed, it’s a

single bed, it’s been light a long time, two hours, three hours, I

watched the light come, it’s slow at first, then it’s sudden, it’s

pale today, a delicate yellow, a pale cold tone, I’m a student o f

light and time; my eyes are swollen open as if I saw something

that fixed them in place but I didn’t see nothing special, I

always wait with m y eyes open, I had them open, I didn’t close

them, it doesn’t help to close them, I waited for light but he

didn’t stop just because there was light, sometimes something’s important to you but it doesn’t matter to someone else

but you don’t know that, you don’t understand it, he lasted

well past the light and then he fell asleep without m oving

much, I wouldn’t have minded turning into a pumpkin but the

lovely lady had to stay at the ball, the beautiful princess loved

by the boy, he liked her so much; then he fell asleep without

m oving much, his body the full length o f mine, half on me,

half off, his arms holding onto me, one spread over me, dead

weight, one leg was spread over me, dead weight; and I was

completely still, I stayed completely still, except m y eyes

wander, and I decide I’m never going to lie down again, I’m

never going to lie down on m y back, I’m going to sit or I’m

going to stand up always from now on, in alleys or in

apartments or anywhere, and I try to move but I hurt, I am

filled with aches under m y skin, in m y bones, in m y joints, in