1.

What’s it like to be so loved?
I ask my sister this.
I don’t like it when you ask me that, she answers, and I don’t get it.
Her legs are laying across my upright body. She’s studying anatomy, tapping my bones and gracing them with proper nouns. Carpals, metacarpals, phalanges, radius, ulna. She’s seventeen in this moment. Nearly a decade younger than me. Humerus, clavicle, scapula, fibula, tibia, tarsals, metatarsals.

2.

What’s it like to be so loved?

3.

The neighbor looks over the fence and comments on the sourwood.

Your tree died, he says.

It did, mom replies.

But now it’s back to life?

We cut the top off, and it’s blooming.

4.

In spring, The Object is harder to contain.

The way a puddle of light reflects in those little cupped vert leaves.

After the wind has made rain of the cherry blossoms.

I return to poetry.

He makes my thoughts fragments.

Petals.

5.

For the first time ever—and this takes years of not speaking—I want to lick him, any of him, all of him. I buy a hard shell chocolate egg filled with orange creme. I imagine cracking it open and drizzling the goo in curlicues across his torso. And now that I miss his body, I feel oddly human. If I miss the shape of him, how crazy could I have been? If I remember how he felt in my hands, how much could have been in my head? How much could have been in my head. The egg sits on my desk.

6.

If asked, The Object would say: you’ve broken me a few times, from laughter. I appreciate how you see the world, expansive and gentle, like all literature majors. You are a writer (fact not a compliment). Your parents shouldn’t be surprised by your restlessness; they raised you an expat. No American city will make you as happy as any city anywhere else. Of course we’re friends, our friendship began once we started talking—about art, travel, philosophy—after sex. Just run away. Stop apologizing. You feel it: it comes from your body; so it’s natural, so it’s real. Yes, I like you, we’re old friends. You wanted to see Mexico so I offered my bed. Maybe we’ll end up in the same city, someday. You’re a little anxious, sure, but always entertaining. What did you say? You’re writing a book in conversation with me? No you hadn’t mentioned it before. When I asked you last December you said you were writing about ‘glitter.’ And those moments the world seems to look you in the face. So. Tell me: do I speak in this book? Am I real? Are you fair? Do you document my body? My hips, the dips in my stomach, my nose hairs? The frequent whispers in your ear? If I read it, when I have the time, one day, maybe, what will I learn about myself—will I come alive?

7.

The Object is real; touchable, feel-able. A thinking body. Tells a different story. Is constructed, finessed. Wispy. Has moving parts. Suffocates. Exists within me, to be mined—not sure where from yet. (Nape of the brain? Behind the skin-curtained chest? Above the left foot’s arc?) Lives in Mexico. Does not deserve this. Should know better, sleeping with a writer… Yes, The Object is real. Though he might object to this.

8.

Plant souvenirs all around the apartment to prepare for his arrival. The clay skull he helped pick out, the gem-eyed carving of a goddess, the braided tote. Clean underneath the stove. (Never have I cleaned underneath the stove.) Cut cucumber slices into stars. Wash sheets, including the decorative pillow, insert and all. Buy a baguette for breakfast. Pretend you are in Paris. Replace the old basil-scented candle on top of the toilet with a new basil-scented candle on top of the toilet. Stop straightening the hair; let it regain its bounce. Shave the entire body over the course of two days, with a new razor blade. Laundry. Consolidate loose packets of gum. String lights across white-washed brick. Pick at the skin no more. Walk instead of taking the metro, to encourage tanning and toning. Make a mental list of museums to bring up in conversation, museums he might like to visit while he’s here, museums in which he might benefit from a tour guide. Put candy gumdrops into vintage sundae dishes. Drape fabric across stains visible on the sofa. Let the whites sun-dry. Organize books by size and color. Hide everything written about him in a drawer by the desk. Purchase lock. Collect all trapped bugs and release outdoors. Unpack suitcase from visiting sister. Bathe. Attempt sleep.

9.

The Object is in the shower. The Object is napping by my side. The Object is writing an essay near my feet on the end of the sofa. The Object is trying to fit a small plate in the dishwasher. The Object is sitting on my desk and talking to his laptop in a language I don’t understand. The Object is rearranging his toiletries. New fact unlocked: The Object uses packing cubes. The Object is checking news on his phone. The Object used the last of the toilet paper. The Object likes black coffee and nighttime tea. I’m in bed, reading. I feel like a balloon simultaneously overfull and slowly deflating. Under pressure and being squeezed. Look at his face, I tell myself, as he’s sitting across from me, at my dinner table. To breathe, I open my mouth and cup my lips around air. Suck.

10.

Look at his lips. Count his wispy mustache hairs. That is The Object. This skin in front of me, the figure in the shower, blowing his nose. Walking through the front door drenched in storm water. Needing my bed to sleep. He: I have other guest houses I can stay in; I don’t mind couch surfing; don’t think I’m treating you as a hostel; After Wednesday I’m going back to Mexico; I just want to make sure we’re on the same page. Me: nod. Me: nod and smile and make sure he feels comfortable. Who am I? This voice? The one writing knows so much better! The fingers tapping on the phone are in control of this narrative. But I, me, I am just a little skin on bones with feelings and I am sad and just want to be whole.

11.

Last night, as he lay beside me in my twin bed, I dreamt of vomit. I started with my most recent meal—a pea and watercress soup—and moved backwards through time, purging myself of every morsel I’d ever had. I opened my mouth wide to the world and everything spilled out in messy bits. My whole family stood next to me. Rubbing my back, holding my hair. I vomited all over them. I woke and felt the remnants in my mouth, tasted their rotten sourness, the traces of organic life. My throat felt sore from the effort, of imagining.

12.

I want to wrap my body around him like I’m the koala. Understand this, it’s not sexual. My parents carried me in their front pocket. Kangaroo. Maybe I’ve never been so happy. I want to hold a sparrow in my hand. Nothing fancy, just a house variety. Feel its hot heartbeat. I think that would ground me. Decided to take up celibacy. Unless I come across a eucalyptus tree? Stillness is a possibility but only when visited by swallowtails. I like the feeling of furry little forelegs tiptoeing along my wrist. Always hoping the bugs under the candle feel this way, in happy surrender. Then again, when my sister asked me what I thought of cows, I said ‘admirable.’ Cows graze and frolic and swat at flies, ignoring the wooden posts preventing their wild whimsy. You’re a cow, my sister told me, like she’d finally figured it out.

13.

It’s different than I imagined, saying I love you. A little laughter—on his end—as he puts a shirt on—to lighten the mood. To pivot. One question answered as he says: It’s hard for me too. The room, dry. That honeysuckle candle needs replacing. Accidents, his head on the amethyst. Turnover. He’s on my side. I watch the mirror from here, the one I cleaned a few days ago, in preparation for this moment. My eyes are blue. Think: this twin bed feels large now. Think: We’re not touching at all. Somehow he falls asleep.

14.

He tried to give me a geography lesson, explaining insurmountable distances. Differences. But I grew up on geology. Mom used melon rinds to describe tectonic plates. She demonstrated the Earth’s motions, its internal, eternal cracks and slips, with cantaloupe and honeysuckle. (This was usually a summer lesson.) I can still feel the spray from two watermelon peels rubbing against each other, colliding. Taste the sweetness through my eyes.

15.

His snores sound familiar. Familial.

Like flies.

16.

One time, during a domestic flight, this fly found its way into the aisle. Spent the entire ride zipping forwards and circling back, presumably confused by the conjoined senses of momentum and entrapment. She hummed, not buzzed, like she was upset to be caught but fascinated to be living out this philosophical problem—excited where she may end up, but desperate for a way out.

17.

New promise.

Sketch it on my skin.

My own backscratcher.

18.

For I will only make a home where I belong.