Tramp Press

At night, my mother creaks. The house creaks along with her. Through our thin shared wall, I can hear the makings of my mother gurgle through her body, just like the water in the walls of the house. I hate the sound. In the daytime, it is covered, wrapped up in the radio and the wind and the low hum of the electricity. But at night, in the silence, her insides gush and she seems alive in a way that, during daylight, she does not. The gush forces thoughts of her effluent, her needs; of the things my grandmother takes care of but that I will have to do someday soon. I don’t want to, which makes me feel bad. I hate her body – it’s an awful thing.

The decision to end this thing comes on slowly, like light filling a room after a fathomless night. It began like this:

In my bed, the first sound of the morning tears the silence and finds me. It’s the hinges of her bed, they pierce the bare rooms of the house with a quiet but sustained whine. High pitched, insistent, it’s the opening of another blank day. Even from the next room, the creaking breaches my body. It slices through my chest and down my upper arms, disturbing me and bringing me back from the pleasant nothing of sleep. The creak scrapes and cries and I am returned to myself, fully (unfortunately)