Content Warning: Self-harm
She cut herself, and I appeared. But she was me.
At least, that’s how it felt. I remember cutting my skin, on purpose, and then I woke up. The dream was strange. I’d been me, but I hadn’t. She was older. Colder. Less rational, or maybe just more into pain? But one thing she wasn’t, was afraid. I remember it feeling… familiar. Natural. Like giving in to an old comfort.
I woke and I stood. I don’t know how I’d managed to fall asleep in the museum, but as soon as I realized I had I was mortified, thinking how many people saw me napping there. No one seemed to be staring, at least, so maybe they just thought I’d been resting my eyes. Maybe I’d only been out for a moment and dreamed it had been a long time; I seemed to remember that having happened before.
I reasoned that I’d dozed off waiting for Marc. That made sense. And there he came, from the Northwest Coast hall, talking on his phone. He walked too fast and bumped into the little woman ahead of him, then held up a hand and gave her a “sorry” grimace and kept talking into the phone as he walked around her. I thought for a second of just leaving, going into another hall and letting him try to find me for twenty minutes. But I didn’t, and a moment later he met my eyes, smiled, and waved.
I could hear someone on the other end — it sounded like his friend Clive. Or coworker Clive. Whichever he was being now. Marc stage-mouthed, “Just One Minute!” and talked back and forth another five before hanging up. He took a deep breath to let it out in a whoosh. “Sorry, babe. Can not get that guy off the phone.”
I took a deep breath of my own and sighed out words. “Maybe don’t pick up Clive’s calls at the museum.”
He looked at me like I’d said something stupid. “I don’t know who Clive is, babe. This was Clay. Worked with him for five years, you’ve meet him, oh, a hundred times?”
Right. Clay. Clive was… someone else. I didn’t say anything. I was realizing that he looks at me that a lot. Then I remembered. Clive was someone from the dream.
“Babe?” Marc startled me, snapping his fingers an inch of my face. “We been here long enough?”
“Yeah.” I spoke before thinking about it. Maybe not? I remembered the dream better than I remembered the exhibition. But it was just sharks, I could probably find out enough on the museum’s website to write the article.
Marc was already moving to the exit. “Great. Tbh, I don’t know why we came.” That’s how he said it: “T-B-H.”
“You didn’t have to come,” I reminded him once we were in the car. I was already wishing we hadn’t.
“What? Nah, babe! I told you, Imma support your work. Su jobbo es mi jobbo.” He tousled my hair near my shoulder. I realized I had both hands on the wheel and hadn’t started the engine yet. It took a little effort to let go with one and turn the ignition.
“I don’t know why they’re wasting you on this stuff,” he went on. “Nobody cares about sharks except during Shark Week. They should let an intern do this, and have you write the important stuff.”
I was focused on on getting out of parking. I asked, “Like what?” I felt like a chatbot running off a script, not retaining anything past my next exchange. I wondered how long had I’d been doing that.
“Idunno,” he struggled. “World events or something. Wars. Putin.”
“Magazine’s about life in New York,” I said. “The museum’s in New York, Putin’s not.”
“Something about the governor, then. He’s gotta have some kind of scandal, right?”
“She,” I said. “For over a year now.” Then we were outside. Never so happy to have the sunlight blinding me. “I guess that’s the scandal.”
“The Mets,” he tried. “You can’t get more New York than the Mets.”
“Not the Yankees?”
“Do you even know me, babe? The Yankees jumped the shark ages ago.”
“We can just go to a Mets game if you want, I don’t have to write about it.”
“It’s not about that,” he sulked, but he dropped it.
When we got home, I went straight to the sofa, sat back, tried to relax. After a minute, I said “Screw this,” got a beer and popped the cap. I sat back on the couch, took a swallow and tried again, with more success: I closed my eyes and started deep breathing. I got to five.
“Hey babe,” Marc said from behind me, “What do you wanna do about dinner?”
I breathed deep and spoke as I let it out. “I was thinking pizza.”
There was a moment of silence. I could visualize him scrunching his face, like he’d tasted something bad. “Babe, we’ve been having a lot of carbs lately. And we ordered in the last three nights.”
“I made burgers last night,” I said. “You didn’t have to eat the bun.”
“Yeah but that was just burgers, that might as well be takeout.”
I put my arm on the back of the couch and pulled my shoulders around to look at him. I waited to see if he was joking, and when I saw he wasn’t I wondered why I’d ever thought he might be.
“It’s fast food, babe, that’s what I’m saying,” he explained. “Can’t we just make something at home?”
I felt déjà vu. Had he said those words before, or was it something from the dream? But no, he hadn’t been in the dream, had he? I still felt it as I said, “You can make whatever you want.”
“Babe, you know I’m not good in the kitchen. That’s your beat! Can you make something? Mac and cheese even?”
“Are you really going to tell me you can’t make mac and cheese? It comes in a box for fuck’s sake.”
He tilted his head and looked to me like an uncertain parrot. “Babe, you don’t sound like yourself.”
“I don’t like ’babe’,” I said at the same time that I thought it.
“What?”
“I don’t like you calling me ’babe’. I don’t think I ever did.”
“Well what the hell am I supposed to call you?”
“What’s my name?”
He squinted. He was confused over my question. But then I saw what came next. For almost a second, he looked blank, before he came to and said, “Dani.” Then he tried to make a scoffing sound, but he couldn’t sell it.
I stared. “You couldn’t remember.”
“What? Of course I could, babe–”
“I hate that,” I reminded him.
“Hate wh– Oh.” He was uncertain. “But I’ve always called you that.”
“And I’ve always hated it.”
“Why didn’t you say something before?”
Why hadn’t I? And why had I now? I felt a weird compulsion to be honest. “I don’t know.” I said. “But now you know.”
“But I have to get used to calling you some other name.” The last word was a whine.
“I had to get used to hearing it,” I said. “But I’m done now. And it’s not ’some other name.’ It’s my name.”
“Dani!” he said quickly, like it was a defensive block.
“You boil the macaroni until it’s soft,” I said. “In water. Then you pour off the water and you add the milk, some butter and the cheese powder. And you mix it. Or don’t. I’m going to bed.”
I walked upstairs, bringing my beer with me. I deep-breathed every step of the way.
In the bathroom, I put the beer on the back of the sink, and looked in the mirror. I looked better than I felt. I still had eyeliner on. I decided washing my face before sleeping was best practice, and as I did I saw a familiar weird random hair right between my eyebrows had reappeared. My old foe, I thought, and reached for the tweezers.
It resisted, but came out on the second try. I looked at it on the end of the tweezer and felt triumph, which immediately turned to… sadness? Disappointment? Something empty. It’s part of me, I thought. Why was I fighting it? I brought it to my cheek, felt only the point of the tweezers. I pressed harder, felt it dig into my skin, the hot line of as I drew it down toward my chin. I put it down, ran my finger over the red scratch that was forming, and let out a breath that I hadn’t realized I’d been holding.
I rinsed the hair down the drain and went to bed.
Marc was sleeping next to me when I woke. On his nightstand was a bowl with a fork and few cheesy macaroni on the bottom.
I slid quietly out of bed and went to the bathroom. I needed to shower. I hadn’t even gotten undressed the night before, so when I turned on the waters I let everything drop to the floor and got in. It wasn’t quite hot yet but I didn’t care; I needed the staccato pounding on my skin. In a few seconds, the water was hot enough to almost hurt and I took down my loofa and body wash and scrubbed until I felt raw and new. I let everything rinse down the drain, then turned off the water and began to towel off.
My eye fell on the tweezer still on the corner of the sink. I continued to towel dry as I stepped out of the shower and in front of the sink. The mirror was clouded by steam so I wiped circles with the towel until I could see, then looked for the line I’d left on my cheek. It was almost faded away. I couldn’t feel it with my fingertips anymore and it no longer stung. I picked up the tweezers in one hand and pressed my thumb against the point until I could really feel it. Then I stopped and put it back behind the mirror.
The saucepan of mac and cheese was still out on the stove. The milk was still out on the counter. So was the box, and the bag from the cheese powder, and the butter, which was already softer than peanut butter. I scraped the mac and cheese into the garbage and ran hot water into the crusty pan to soak. I put away the milk in case it hadn’t spoiled yet, then started coffee. The rest I’d get to later.
I didn’t feel like doing much but I also really felt hungry for an omelet, specifically. Hunger won out and I took out ingredients and a cutting board. I’d done onions and taken a paring knife to a tomato when Marc came into the kitchen.
“You’re cooking with this mess still out?” he asked.
I stopped cutting. “I didn’t make the mess,” I said evenly.
He made the scoffing sound. Like a loose raspberry or tiny, flapping inner tube. “Are you really gonna be like that, babe?” he asked. “That’s kind of petty.”
I half-turned my shoulders to look at him and he took a half-step back. I wondered why, and realized I was holding the paring knife in the hand now turned toward him. The realization felt good, and I looked down to run my thumb up and down the side of the blade, for a moment thinking more about it than him. That felt good, too.
I met his gaze without moving my head. “I cleaned up half of the mess,” I said. “You can clean up the rest if you want. And if you don’t, I’ll probably do it eventually.”
I went back to the omelet as he sullenly threw away the packaging and the butter. He didn’t touch the pan.
I took a lot of pleasure making that omelet. I smelled the foaming butter with satisfaction, and poured the eggs. After adding the tomatoes and onions I ground in pepper, then added thyme and a few slips of Parmesan, and triple folded it. I let it get a little more brown than most chefs would stand for because it’s what I wanted.
I slid it onto a plate and sat down with coffee. Marc was already at the table with his coffee. He looked up and frowned. “You didn’t make one for me?”
I closed my eyes and realized that I somehow still had the paring knife in my hand. Or again. Deep breathing again, I slid it down my thigh, past my shorts, and felt the cool metal on my skin. I twirled the point lightly and remembered the tweezer the night before. I got lost in the feeling. It comforted.
“Babe?”
I pulled the knife. The blade cut.
I woke up.
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