roll down your window

I would never roll the windows down in a car that is not my own.

I would not roll down the window in my father’s car, nor my mother’s car. I would not roll down the window in an Uber; I would not roll down the window anywhere, at anytime, for any reason, on my own.

If the heat was turned up to the max, and sweat dripped down my face and sides and back, I would not do it. I would sit there and take the heat into me, like grass under the sun, and I would not move a muscle.

If I felt trapped, if lightheadedness took me out of my body and I found I could not speak or see or breathe, I would not do it. My silence would roll through the open space between carseat and dashboard and gear, filling the crevices with the weight of my wary consent.

If nausea overcome me in a fearsome wave, and I swelled with the urge to empty my stomach in a dizzying haze, even all over myself, I would not roll down my window of my own volition. I would open my mouth, and I would ask permission to do it, and it would be done; it is hardly my own fingers on the button.

Within my own car, I can do it. My fingers press with ease, and then, and only then, the windows come down, and I am free.

I love the windows down. I love the breeze on my face, the way it whips my hair and cools my face and neck with its chill. I love the sound, the rush of air, of life through a tiny crack.

I want to put their windows down, one day soon. I want to roll their windows down, to see what it would feel like for me. I want their windows down because of me. I want to put them down, just to prove I can.