On Deceit
BY SARAH BURACK
PIECE 1
I saw a boy outside of my kitchen window one morning. He was carrying potted trees across the parking lot. One at a time, he carried them across the pavement. I wondered why he had so many trees. It does not add up. On the fifth tree, it became absurd, so I yelled down to him, “Are you selling those trees?” He shrugged, “Sure, I’d sell these trees.” I bought a fiddle leaf fig and a type of palm, my friend bought two others. A day or two after the transaction, I realized the boy and I had matched a few weeks ago on Tinder. His opening line to me, a stranger, a month before: “Sarah, I think I’m in love.” I replied to him upon recognizing the connection, after the fiddle leaf fig sat happily in my new apartment: “Thanks for the trees.” ----- PIECE 2 If midnight is for lust, dawn is for love. The time before the first light. I’ve read before that in the moments before we come to a full consciousness, we’re closer to our true, primordial self. As each sense awakens, the mind isn’t yet consumed by to-do lists, bills. One just exists. What a feeling to wake up to eyes instead of a phone screen! A quiet understanding. A quiet comfort. There are less distractions and everything is simpler. I am surprised at myself time and time again for my lack of anxiety waking up to strangers and lovers alike. I think it is because I do not have to go on to being my proper self yet, I can go on a little while longer merely existing as a body. One night this summer, I was awoken around 3 or 4 am by my friend banging on my bedroom door. My temporary summer subletter heard her cry out at our apartment and let her in. I heard the subletter close her door and go back to sleep. My friend was sobbing and drunk. Stunned, I told her to come lay down, anything she needs. I held her as she cried and told me about the boy upstairs in my building who had put his hand on her knee. Who had moved it slowly up and down, leaning, hunting for a kiss. She had slept with him before, but he had deceived her, hiding that he was in a relationship the whole time they had been involved. Her body shook and I held her. Her wailing and disappointment slowly subdued, I let go. We instead let my heavy down blanket hold us both. I fell back asleep. In the moments before dawn, I feel as though we are sisters. We are both awake now. I am very comfortable. Before she gets up, apologizes, and recounts her evening with much more rationale, there is a quiet understanding. If midnight is for lust, dawn is for love. ----- PIECE 3 I used to worry and wonder how girls like me could feel so much. The girls who are empowered before, during, and after sex but left so often in an unfinished romance. So often my affection unrequited, the line blurred between physicality and sentiments. I’d tell myself this narrative, that I must bottle up my happiness and seal the jar. Soon, I would deem a man worthy and open the jar, love pouring out of my eyes like tears, or rays of light. Infatuation, perhaps, colors the world. Collar bones, become the most exquisite branches, ribs as roots underneath the flesh holding together our bodies. Fingers, tracing. The warmth of a touch that has been dreamed about… surely the construction of love in the mind is what creates the best sex. Imagination. Sometimes it is as good as you imagine. But, then he doesn’t call, or text, or snapchat. A warning I should have taken seriously. A switch flicked. This kind of sex doesn’t cause my affliction, for love just pours out over him and out onto my sheets and seeps into the wooden floor like liquid gold. To waste. I don’t know where it goes. The basement that smells like pee, maybe. This is extremely exhausting. But I fiend after boys anyways, of course, giving them an unwarranted amount of love. There is no option. When you feel so much, it can be good to not carry that weight, for a moment. To let someone else relish in your affection, if just for a little while. I do my best to see, to know someone, to love them as they come, but then for it to all be in vain? It’s interesting, maybe doing something in vain is just a reflection of our own failed vanity. We presume to receive something in return. Unspoken expectations are the under watering that causes stagnate love to shrivel up, until it is wrinkled and dry and unrecognizable from a once intoxicating lust. I’ve never been capable of stopping my feelings. No, someone has taped the switch permanently on. I refill my pot of honey. Change is slow, but good. He didn’t steal my happiness— I gave it freely. I must be empty to fill myself with something new. Some may call this an opportunity. Perhaps it is selfish to ask that lovers love me back. I will be here whether they love me or not, why not give? No, I can cultivate that sparkly golden goop that shines in the 5pm light, I’ll put it on my eyelashes before bed and rub it on my dry knees and elbows after a bath. If I can care for others, I can care for myself too. Soon another man will look at me like I’m honey (yes, I know very well the look of hunger in his eyes), and think I’m made for his own particular indulgence. It’s alright though. Share in my bounty, I’ll say, share this light. Consume me, I’ll say, I was here before you and I will be here long after. |