Written by Highest Kite
I. I’m Addicted to Sadness
When I left for the university library this morning, my text to you said it was to think and write. But really, it was to sink, give in and cry. I had a row with my folks again last night and barely slept afterwards. Who am I when I am neither a daughter nor sister? A woman? I doubt it.
I believe the term comes with a wave of decisiveness: enroll for a literature degree, work hard, write, fuck a kind lover and sing. But at any moment, I only seem to accomplish one of these dreams. Today is Monday and usually, my sole motivation is a newsletter from She Leads Africa. Every week, a winning African woman is highlighted and I’ve read about ladies who quit their steady incomes and started afresh; bad bitches who had to restart their enterprises after COVID 19. Every Monday morning, my sole intention is to soar.
Then comes Tuesday, or a lonely evening, or stern wordplay with no warmth, or is it just me awake at 2:34 a.m? My body is warm, then cold, folding, unfolding until I resign and smoke.
II. If You Leave, I’ll be Okay
What do you think I should write about? “Not us,” you once said, then added, “but if you must, then I won’t read it. Is that okay?” I thought it was. But as I scroll through the unopened files I’ve sent your way, I wish you would read and see how I see you; who I am when I’m no proper portrait; who you are when you’re mine.
In the past, I had a lover who over-explained why a bag hanging off his wall held female garments. He insisted I didn’t need to worry nor go through his belongings because the relationships had long been over and he was a good man. I listened to him fill a half-hour with reasoning so off my motives he’ll never have a clue that I was trying to rob him. But since he was a ‘real’ adult, he didn’t need to hide his money or marijuana and if I couldn’t spot a note, coin or joint, there simply wasn’t any. It was how he later lost a raincoat and a crop top hoodie he swore (and proved with photos) was his sister’s.
One afternoon, I spilled blue nail polish on his carpet and couldn’t stand him finding and lording the mess over me. I looked around the bedsitter for a pair of scissors but had to use his kitchen knife instead. As I cut out the affected radius, I admitted I was only doing so because the blue in Luron Polish is permanent and I didn’t want him to remember me; not in the least. In a way, what I held and did felt as though there had been a vine from him to me and I had taken a blade to it.
Two years prior to this, I had once again listened to a man, who was really a plug, insist on how he knew me and what I needed. According to him, one day he would kidnap me, lock me in a room and endlessly supply me with weed. I blocked him as soon as I got home and the last I saw him, over a year ago, he was riding his bike while calling my name. I was walking on the sidewalk and didn’t return his shouts. Anyone who looked my way met as dazzled a face as theirs. Who was he calling? I didn’t know either, I pretended.
His words were a threat to my life, weren’t they? That he understood my needs ended at a bag of weed, a safe room to get high in and my own beating heart. What bothered me was him doing it all so he could fuck me. In my dreams, my life sweetly involves marijuana: wake up, bake; go through the day dazed; go to sleep baked! Maybe if he’d proposed the plan in the name of love I’d have been okay but I was twenty-three and he was thirty-one. Did he really think the younger the dumber? I didn’t mind shattering this illusion by ghosting him when he thought things were going swell. They all believe so but I never do.
I first noticed this in college when I’d spend my time doing whatever I like, then suddenly I’d hit a block through which my fingers couldn’t work through and I didn’t mind fucking a man. I hated relationships though; still do. I know I’m definitely not optimistic or willing to sail the boredom but romance really gets me down. I try to be the accommodating beauty and I don’t like that.
III. I Feel Lucky not in Love
I was really hurt when you hinted I am the reason you no longer go to church. Since I admire how you work six days a week, I thought Sunday was our day but I’m getting the message that your free time is not necessarily time to spend with me. But you never call babe, never invite me over or outside for a date, you don’t see me unless I see you and I’m over the occasional attention. I feel you crossed a line with the Church comment and maybe because of it, I’m beginning to solidly accept myself because no one else will.
I know I’ve only told you half of this but on top of not believing in Christ, I do not want to be a mother nor do I look forward to heading a family. Am I sure? Seventy-thirty leaning on solitude. I’ve been the sister at home, raising her brothers, cooking for her father, ironing her mother’s dresses and pretending I care for accumulating dust but I don’t and I’m tired of pretending, of not speaking, of not living. I wish I could send my thoughts as a long text but I doubt you would see things how I do, or even see me.
So, for a month now, I’ve been testing a theory where I am my own boyfriend. I send myself reminders, uplifting notes, take myself out for lunch and decide if being with me is really as difficult as past lovers and you have implied. It isn’t and I’m okay. Shit I’m so okay I’m allowing myself to live and always expand my range of needs. I don’t just require a room to smoke marijuana in, to live. There’s lots more in the world for me.
Like this girl I met outside a Naivas Cafe who was not embarrassed to pose and take plenty of photos at the expense of my time and phone charge. There’s still more like an all Gen-Z female writers group where I can share tips on writing cover letters for submission. There’s a whole world outside and I want to be part of it. I want to drink in the sun and not believe a happier me is just beyond my being saved or sober. Fuck it Bae! I am alive now!
And I’m through with feeling second; through with accepting your description of me that I am imperfect, lacking and will have to change while you are good because you neither smoke nor drink nor want to leave your parents’ house. What if you simply don’t like me and I simply don’t like you? What if your goodness is fitting for the world but not for me?
I know we’ve discussed it before and it’s nothing for you but earlier in the year, having to watch only four members of a nearly two score family actively care for our ill grandparents was heavy. Everyone else was busy and the selected few had a track record of bending their backs. So, what if I want to be better at an art entirely uninvolved with browning onions, mashing tomatoes until they disappear, and acutely disinfecting the bathroom? What if I am not deficient because I am different?
IV. I’m Done
Today is Saturday and I woke up to clear my to-do list. By 10am, I was done with designing a newsletter, prepping a curio load for Mom’s store and doing my laundry. Afterwards, I was restless and went shopping early for bread, greens and beef, all so I could mask the 300ml vodka bottle I came back with. At noon I texted you:
– bae, I’m drinking
– I thought unafua (you were doing laundry)
– I am; I can do both
– silence
– bae ?
– silence
– I know you don’t approve but I promise I’m good!
– silence
– bae?
When you do reply, it’s Monday afternoon and it’s to say you were surprised and unable to handle it—my ability to get fucked up. It makes no difference to me. I surely do not have the calls-her-babe-because-she’s-drunk type of relationship. Ours is for the mature league, the philosophers who only live to reason. The animal in you is subdued, mine, overused. There is no room for me here and I am done.
