I let it consume me.
I lethimconsume me.
I feed thefuckingbeast.
9
JASMINE
As a child,I never slept with the lights off.
I had glow-in-the-dark stars stuck to the ceiling of my bedroom—cheap plastic things that peeled at the corners and lost their glow by midnight. When those faded, I kept a cigarette lighter under my pillow. I’d flick it on just to watch the flame, warm and alive, dancing like it could chase the monsters out from under my bed.
When I lost the lighter, all I had left was the blue light spilling in from the living room—the TV left on all night. That soft electric glow under the crack of the door, flickering with late-night talk shows and‘I Love Lucy’reruns. And when all else failed I had the moaning of my mother, her pain, love, anger flowed through the trailer as easy as air, and I swallowed it willingly, eagerly even.
If my mother had a boyfriend, I slid my toy box in front of my door and slept with my shoes on. Something my mother taught me at four.
Men are unpredictable,she’d say, lighting a cigarette with one hand, stirring boxed mac and cheese with the other.They say they love you, and maybe they even mean it. But they always love something more.
Other people. Younger people. Hurting people. Money. Drugs. Control.
Men will always love something more than you,she’d murmur, eyes heavy with an incoming high, her voice thick with resignation.And all women want is to be loved, right?
She never said it bitterly. Just… truthfully. Like it was a fact as fixed as gravity. Like heartbreak was a birthright passed from mother to daughter in place of lullabies.
And maybe it was.
Her first couple of boyfriends were kind enough to me. Mean enough to her. The kind of men who opened jars and doors, but not their mouths when she cried. They came and went like bad weather—never staying long, always leaving for someone better, someplace better.
I mean not everyone left for better. My father left because he loved music more than he loved my mother. More than he loved me. At some point, he loved drugs more than music, when he came back home drugged out and desperate it was boyfriend #4 who got rid of him for good.
It was boyfriend number four who scared me so much I pissed in a bucket instead of walking past him to use the bathroom.
He used to fall asleep on the couch in just his boxers, the TV playing old WWE reruns on a low, endless loop. He never turned the volume down, just let the sounds of grunts, slams, andyelling fill the trailer until morning. He’d sit there half-awake, half-drunk, slouched deep into the cushions with his legs spread wide, like he ran the place. Like he paid for anything.
There was something wrong about him.
Not loud wrong. Not obvious.
But the kind of wrong that made the air feel heavier when he walked into a room. Like everything got a little quieter. Tighter.
His eyes were the worst part.
They never stayed where they were supposed to. Always looking too long, too low. His stare felt thick, like it stuck to your skin. I’d catch him watching me and feel my stomach twist. Not because of what he said—he never said much—but because of what he didn’t. Because of what Icouldn’tprove.
Just the way he looked at me made me feel like I needed a shower.
I avoided him as much as I could. Kept my door locked. Slept with my shoes on. Slept in layers, even when it was hot.
One night, I couldn’t help it. I was twelve and thirsty, and the water jug in my room was empty. So I crept into the kitchen barefoot, careful not to let the floorboards squeak.
He was already there. Sitting at the table in the dark. No shirt. Just staring.
“You always this quiet, kid?” he said, voice low and wet-sounding, like something rotting in his throat.
I froze.
His eyes moved over me in a heavily slow motion, like it was difficult for his eyes to stay above my chin. I wore one of my old childhood tank tops, stretched thin at the straps and too loose around the chest. I crossed my arms, trying to shrink.
