Dressed up in Awkward.

Held together by safety pins, I secure straps of an ill-fitting shirt to that ratty old bra I promised you I’d retire but kept because it goes so well under everything I own, regardless of the underwire protruding white satin, marking indents on soft tit flesh.

I fidget in a room full of strangers, tugging at fabric which doesn’t breathe in summer heat but instead traps sweat, pooling beads of insecurity at the small of back, bleeding through fabric shrink-wrapped to that unseemly swatch of small hairs collected at the nape of spine, a bunny tail.

Shoes, weather-worn faux-leather, stick to swollen pads trapped in pools of stench I’ll apologize to the cat for later when, at home and alone, I slip off the smell and wash toes outlined in sticky dark dirt under bathroom taps which drip-drap into the chipped porcelain sink I neglected to rinse the last time I perched on the edge of the bathroom counter, feet sunk deep.

Bumping the shoulders of these strangers, I order another drink and, with a mighty gulp, shush the rush running laps round my brain as I strategically balance the energy of a room off-kilter. I check my cell again and again and again to look real important, phone face casting eerie blue glow on heat-flushed cheeks, a trick of light making my face look less cordial, more gelid.

Like a lost puzzle piece, I can’t find a fit: shirt too sloppy, shoes too tight, gaze too long, laugh too loud.

Dressed up in awkward, I finger the hole in my back jeans pocket and pray it won’t rip wide to show the sheath of bubble gum pink panties, a little girl playing dress up in mom’s clothes, hiding the stuff of childhood under layers of makeup and lace.

We exchange pleasantries: the rehearsed social motions of hullos and well-thank-you’s and you-know-the-usual’s. You pretend you care because you caught my eye: an obligation to the too long stare when, after you looked away, you realized there was no one standing beside you to goad into conversation and so, without a runaway lane, you’re forced to suffer through the robotic dance: left hand motion hair swipe, right cheek lift half smile, gaze down 4, 3, 2, 1, and up, maintain eye contact, break left, side step right foot, indicate exit, half hug (right arm over left shoulder), two pat reassurance, turn, turn, turn and…cut.

I repeat this dance with 12 other partners – the motions more fluidal the darker it gets – when, after having shed the last of the reserve energy, I nod in your general direction, bid my leave and think what a relief it is to swallow the starry night on the long journey home and not ever have to tell you how discomfited it really was to see you that way.

xoxo

M.L. H’art