Alexa Doran
SLEEPOVER @ [REDACTED]
In the coral-fleck of a restroom, I learned to hate my mother. You and I puckered our nipples together. A privacy I would feel only once. When Engels said all knowing is sensuous measurement, he predicted this moment, this shudder, the JC Penney pads of our bras pulling aside to compare areola color. Side by side in the toothpaste-shock of my father’s mirror, we checked our tits for progress, tried to be scientific, to swaddle our evaluation in logic. No one taught us to love anything but the men we were supposed to impress with our A-cup chests so we tried to assess what future boyfriends would like best. I still think I could have loved mom if she hadn’t slipped into that stall, hadn’t been the first to lift a cover I didn’t even know was drawn. Not that I ever believed in silver bells or the sparkle-coat of snow but I wanted something so gentle it would fall forever before meeting god’s loam. And now with her cackle, her perm, life is never bigger than the gesture of her hands, than the check of your eyes as you realize secrets don’t exist, just the hush of our mothers and the gaze of an unknown man.