Killers

We all knew of the girl who drowned; she sank like a stone, they said; she was showing off that night, they said; the guys all said; the water is deeper than it appears; and we're not the worst swimmers, but it's dark; we don't swim at night; no, we don't swim at night with guys; we all knew of the girl who drowned; she sank like a stone, they said; she was showing off that night, they

We meet guys at the boathouse tonight; they're here for the end of the summer; they're polished; but we're polished; we stare out across the water; we murmur nothing and pretend it's more; so the guys look over or don't look over; either way, it means the same thing;

They'll be done with us at some point; we'll have squandered their time, they'll say; so they'll threaten us; they'll scare us. So murder us, we'll shout while laughing too loudly, like fuck these men; who the fuck are these folks;

We discover this summer that we belong to a demographic: we're girls who attend prestigious schools; girls who excel in their subjects; girls who spend the entire summer at the beach and become the beach's stars;

So, this summer, we find out we've been divided into two groups; I realize that we are divided into more than two groups; I wouldn't call us shattered. We aren't strewn around your floor in a jumble; I'd describe it as shattered; I'd describe it as cracked.

the ride to the shore this summer was long, and no one talked; I lay across the back seat watching clouds; I slept and dreamed my parents were singing loudly in the front; but when I woke, my mother was sleeping, her head drooped to her chest; my father was staring straight ahead; the radio was playing the song from my dream; it wasn’t the song I would have played, were I in charge; that song would have been good and loud; the windows would have been all the way down; my parents wouldn’t have been there;

My father sits at the table with me in the mornings; he's mad at me, he says; I've been coming home too late, he says; I've been coming home too drunk; but I can barely hear him; something is wrong with him; I can't say what it is; so I'll say there's something like a ghost; something at the table, sitting next to my father, sitting on top of my father; but I can barely hear him;

We're the shore's stars this summer; we open our throats to drink; we drink whatever is poured into our cups; we don't mind if things get mixed up; like brown drinks mixed with clear; like clear drinks mixed with wine; we don't mind whose shirt we're wearing; whose car we're in; whose boat; we're the girls, this summer, everyone wants; and we dance on the guys; we dance on the chairs; we use our tongues to tie cherry stems into knots; we open our mouths to show you the nicely knotted stems;

The girl who drowned was a local girl; we knew her tan lines when she wore a dress; we knew what they said about her; she was a knockout, they said; the guys all said; even my father said she was a knockout; but she wasn't that bright, my father said; so there was no one to blame for her drowning but her;

But I think about that night a lot; I think about that girl a lot; I keep the word killers under my lips.

Some nights, I lie down and close my eyes; I can feel their weight above me; I can feel like a girl in a good way; and then I can feel like a girl in a bad way; I send my brain to other thoughts, while my body lies there, pretending; I think about light and the speed of light; I think about black holes; and how there is no right-side up or upside down in outer space; there is no sound on the moon;

It was something to do with its size, or its depth; by depth, I only mean physical; though one could make a case for another kind, a holy kind; my father was silent; my mother slept through it; but I was impressed, I now admit; it was something to do with its size, or its depth; my father was silent; my mother slept through it; but I was impressed, I now admit; it was something to do with its size, or its depth; it was something to do with its size.

they’re polished, these guys, so we followed them, like dogs, to the dock; now we dangle our legs off the edge; they throw their cigarettes into the water; they throw crushed cans, and I think some things; like how we’re not the kind to throw shit in; but we’re not the kind to say, Don’t throw that shit; when the cans hit the water, the guys say, What; we say, What, and look to the other side; the other side is the poor side; it’s a strip of dirty beach; it’s weathered motels tilted into a road; it’s beaten up houses and couches on the lawns; it’s the jetty the locals hang out on; we’re not supposed to go to that side; but we’re not supposed to do so many things; our demographic is confusing; all the expectations, all their opposites;

there are mountains on the moon tall as the ones on earth; but they’re terrible, treeless; gray and dust; thinking of them, I can scare myself; I can see myself floating there;

at the ends of nights, we’re under a tree or in a boat or in a bed and taken home; our makeup isn’t what it was; our clothes are twisted; our shoes are somewhere; there are girls who walk us to find our shoes; these are younger girls who want to be us; they’re our shadows and we hate them;

mornings, my father slams his fork to the table; he pounds the table so that everything shakes; he tries his best to stare me down; but I’ve perfected a better stare; I practice it, nights, on the younger girls; I can make my eyes go completely flat; it’s terrifying how I look;

the guys have ways to make us give them what they want; they look directly at our mouths; they touch our hair and say it feels so soft; You smell like something I want to eat, they say; You smell like strawberries, they say; they ask us things to make us feel smart; they say, What would you do for a thousand dollars; they say, Would you steal a boat; they say, Would you kill someone; they say, Would you sleep with us; their mouths are at our ears; we’re like a thousand dollars; we try not to laugh; they’re becoming disappointing; at the boathouse, we wanted to be with these guys; now, with these guys, we want to be at the boathouse; this is a grass-is-greener situation; it has to do with perspective; like how the water from afar is one thing; the water up close is another; like how a body from afar is something; and a body from inside that body is something else;

the younger girls would sense the potential danger; they would run back to their houses before things got too wild; their parents would wake and make them tea; but my parents are sleeping their deep drugged sleep; my parents are sleeping each at his or her edge of the bed;

Love is still viewed as arrows through hearts by the younger ladies. Please, girls, I know what love is; it's just tiny motors whirling in one's saddest, darkest regions.

We frequently drink what's left in cans; we smoke what's left on the ground; we don't give a damn if we appear to be trash; If our shirts and shorts come off, we'll be in trouble. When we dance like way, it's about more than just dancing; it's about expressing ourselves. When we use our tongues to tie cherry stems into knots; when we're found sobbing in a boat and can't explain why; when we're found in a boat and can't explain why; when we're found in a boat and can't explain why; when we're found in a boat

We say, "For a million dollars, we'd sleep with you." But not for a thousand, we say; I realize how fucked up we sound; like what are we, total whores; then it's one thing to another fast; we only want the one thing; we'll let them kiss us; we'll let them go up our shirts; but that's not good enough for them; because it hurts, they say; it can go right to their brains; it can fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck

so they must have forgotten who we are; that we’re the tops of our classes; that we know how the body works; and the moment they know this was all a waste; and the moment we know they know; they make a sound to represent agony; the sound reminds me of an animal from a show I saw as a child; they say, What the fuck is your problem; where do we start;

we know the universe is still expanding; we know we’re shooting farther and farther out into what;

we know the sun will, at some point, collapse; that the earth will be burned to dust;

I tried, once, to explain these things in detail to my parents; my mother said, What’s she talking about; my father: Hell if I know;

We can't afford to let these guys off the hook; As we walk, I say, "Just murder me." They say they're going to throw us in; we're screaming, Put us down; I'm screaming, Fucking killers; and it's all our fault for being such stars; for being such whores; and for a second, I think love; but now we're whipping through the air like trash; we're over their shoulders and spinning; they say they're going to throw us in; we're screaming, Put us down; they say they're going to throw us in;

My father claims she wasn't brilliant; and she wasn't, if you think of bright as top of your class; but if you think of bright as light, she was; one night, we were on the pier, and there she was, carrying a shoe in each hand; I could see her remembering how wild the boys were on the jetty; I could see her through the guys' eyes, my father's eyes; that night I became her shadow, and she had no idea;

at the table, I stare my father down; I’m terrifying with my stare; it’s like I’m stuck in some kind of trance; then everything is fractured; and it’s a hundred forks; a hundred fathers; a hundred mothers saying, What’s her problem; a hundred fathers saying, Go to hell;

we’re spinning, and all I can think is water; I think of how cold it’ll be; I think of how hard we’ll hit; I think of how far it is to the bottom; and what I would miss above; not my mother and father’s fucked up shit; not the younger girls who wish so bad they were us; not these beautiful, agonized guys;

I would miss the feeling of everyone looking at us; of everyone laughing at us; the feeling, after, of sleeping it off;

I would miss the next-day feeling of starting again; of barefoot, getting something to eat;

and don’t think we’re just teases; I also think about getting them off; I think about putting my hand on them; I think about putting my mouth on them; I think about lying under them; I don’t even need to be good at it; I don’t even need to look;

the ride back to the city will take me farther and farther from what I am; I’ll lie across the back seat thinking, God;

were I in charge, the summer would go backward; we would start out split and end up not;

were I in charge, I would lie alone on the dock and feel the tiny motors whir while staring out at stars;

there’s a moment, spinning, when spinning feels like being still; and I remember how I spun on the lawn, summers, when I was younger; I remember the how hard the earth pulled me down; how when I finally stood, the grass stayed flat in the shape of me; and the grass would rise as I walked away; and I would grow too old for this game;

so do they throw us in; do we slowly sink; does light stop; does sound change; is it suddenly cold; do we feel the fish; the plants and trash; the sharp edge of a crushed can;

does the girl who drowned swim back to us; is she a knockout still; do we love her still; do we love her enough to stay;

or do we push to the top; do we burst face first; are we a miracle; or the opposite; predictable; do we lie under them on the dock;

because there’s no sound on the moon, I often think about screaming on the moon; I think about what it would be to open my mouth and push out a scream I can feel but not hear;

because there’s no right-side up or upside down in outer space, I often, when looking at the sky, feel I’m dangling above it;

what I mean is, girls, there is no love the way you think of love;

what I mean is, girls, I’m sorry;

in the show I saw when I was a child, an animal was running on dirt; I was supposed to be watching something else; I wasn’t supposed to be watching; I was supposed to be doing my homework; there were things to learn; the beginnings and ends of worlds to understand;

but someone had turned on this show; and I couldn’t look away; a guy’s voice was saying things; his voice was getting louder; there was a giant orange sun; a leafless tree; the animal running fast on the dirt; the animal running faster; this animal on that animal;