Bellies

by Nicola Dinan

People didn’t ask about this stuff enough. Nobody wants to admit that people leave the closet but not the room.

Sometimes a person, an achievement or a place—whatever is missing—seems the perfect shape to fill a void, so much so that its absence seems to be the cause of the problem and its presence the solution. But up close, the voids are always much larger.

“I’m speaking the shame away. I’m showing you my belly.” “What?” “It’s this analogy we’re using in therapy,” she said. “There’s a lot of fear in showing it, for some animals. Because you’re at risk of being mauled.” I nodded slowly. “Our insides aren’t worth much to other people, I guess.” “Some people,” she said. “It sounds like hippie bullshit, but I think the risk is worth it. It’s how you learn who cares, and it stops you from punishing yourself so much for being you.”

Some memories harden into land mines. I don’t know where the pressure points are.