Melted

Part I

Blue wisps of shaving cream envelop my thighs. Clouds pervade them as if they were towering mountains. I am money-hungry company. Gliding the razor across tight 14 year old skin not young enough anymore for seeds planted in follicles to not grow thicker trunks. Clients liken hair to dirty, dirty to themselves, themselves to reality.

Boi, they don't come to me for reality.

Slicing down countless branches, I am three years old, an explorer. Reminiscences of ripples in body creased Salvation Army batman blankets turned ridges on the side of Everest. Staled sandpaper pillows turned boulders. Lint textured mismatched Spider-man and Captain America pajamas turned gear. Now, I am three year old mentality in the excavation of smooth caramel.

Only, all I find is hills. White stone ranges in the form of jagged uneven pinstriped lines on the sides of my hips. Decorating perceptions by recounting false memories of body recession or inflation, disguising the stagnation of jackknifed ribs and vacant cups made from collarbones.

Throat strung with copper wire, viscous crimson grazing the tastebuds standing in the back of my throat, blocking my airway. New fingerprints branded into my body memory, still warm. Dragging my fingertips over the engravings, the grooves don't fit into mine.

Did they see the stretch marks? They best haven't seen my stretch marks. Boi I don't cost extra for stretch marks. Unless they ass got a tiger fetish, homeboy ain't gon' see these marks and be like "That right there gonna be money well spent."

Maybe they'll see this and think it's like beauty in imperfection. I don't know, yesterday I was reading this Wikipedia page, like I always do when I ain't got nothing happening, and it was about this thing called Wabi-Sabi. Apparently the Japanese hella clumsy; they break mad pots and smelt gold to fuse the pieces together. They call it beautiful. I call it an excuse for profit. I guess imma need more Japanese clients.

A growl escapes my mother's throat. The yawn reverberating her soft platelet, she sleeps blissfully ignorant. She is dandelion stem in a crack of the sidewalk, moonlight leaking onto her seeds. Nobody around to endanger the fragility of her temper except sporadic pops engulfing Chicago "silence" of siren, almost like moving cars. Humboldt Park taught her how to bolt herself to her bed because pride wasn't worth the college money we needed, or the bullet we didn't. She doesn't have fast reflexes anyway.

I prop myself in between the warmth of my home and the frigid air of bottles submerged in crinkled brown paper bags, the window sill being the middle ground. Outlooking the street lights, bulbs illuminated like fireflies frozen still, I make my way down to the porch, sliding the length of the roof. Counting the echoes of my feet on sticks and stones instead of the wooden steps or the slabs of concrete leading to the gate. As the frosty metal bars bit at my hands, I gripped to them, climbing until a familiar crunch resounded from beneath me, all asphalt and rubber soles.

I wonder if I'll give a discount for talking, or I'll just try to charge more. I really want to talk, and I really want money. You know what, who cares.