Brutes

by Dizz Tate

We hid our faces because we were certain that someday, someone else would reveal them back to us, tuck our hair behind our ears and tell us how beautiful we were, had been all along, in secret.

We would not be born out of sweetness, we were born out of rage, we felt it in our bones.

I did what I always did, which was to disappear for a few months, then text, miss you!!!!! with no explanation. I used exclamation points instead of excuses.

I want to live inside this moment forever, but if I’ve learned anything it’s that even movement becomes another kind of stillness if you force it to last too long.

My mother and I have traded places since I have grown up. We have bartered our fear. She pretends to be afraid and I pretend to be fearless.

I used to be curious about other people but now I am curious about myself. I often feel like I am living my life three feet to the left of my body. I let her live her life over there while I watch her. I prefer to be empty and cavernous.

They notice, as women notice everything, but women are as good at ignoring things as they are at understanding them.

My heart feels like a solid dead thing. I can’t even feel it beating.

We have always been afraid of being alone but we thought we knew the cure: being together. Now we are together and we still feel alone.

He wants to experience the two extremes of life constantly. My daughter is doomed. She wants to understand them.

I am all flesh to them. They would be terrified to think of my bones.