Confession 12
I was eight years old and so afraid, I decided this wasn’t happening. Not to me. No, it was
happening to that other little girl, as I called her. Or Ganymede, my imaginary twin. Or was her
name Gisselle? I changed her name every week. But it always began with G. Gigi, Giselle,
Ganymede, Galaxy, Genie, Guinevere. Or just G.
Whatever her name, she was the one going to the hospital for eye surgery. My mother
dropped her off with a receptionist. You could do that back then—drop your child off for
surgeries. Or at least that’s what Mama said. G watched her leave, her yellow raincoat
swinging behind her as she hurried down the hallway. G sat alone on a metal chair in the
waiting room, her belly tight as a fist, until the nurse, a heavyset woman with hair the color
of apricots, called my name and led her into a curtained room, told her to change into a
hospital gown, and fastened the strings behind her neck. She offered her a sedative and a
crinkly paper cup of water. “It won’t be long,” the nurse smiled, leaving her on a hospital
bed, patting her head, walking away, her shoes squeaking on the linoleum.
Outside it was raining. G looked out at the city below, the rain streaking the windows, the
tiny cars moving on the streets below. She closed her eyes and listened to the rain drumming
against the glass. Or was that the sound of her heartbeat, racing, blood rushing in her head?
When the nurse came back, she lifted G onto a stretcher, and rolled her through corridors
and into elevators, stopping in a brightly lit operating theater. “You should be asleep by
now,” she said before leaning over her, her body pouring over G like hot pudding as she
explained. “I’m just going to place this mask over your nose and mouth.” All at once, the
nurse was flying backwards across the room. I have no memory of touching her.
Nor did G. “You nasty little thing!” the nurse shrieked.
“She didn’t mean to,” I said as doctors rushed in. They grabbed that other little
girl, pinned her to the bed and pressed a rubbery black mask onto her face. She
kept kicking and flailing. A mist of acrid sweetness dripped into the back of my
throat.
“Is she out?” one doctor asked.
“She’s out,” another said. I could see her, lying beneath me on a white sheet, still
trying to turn her head and move her arms and legs—like a pinned butterfly, still
alive. “Ganymede,” I whispered. “Giselle. Gigi, Galaxy, Guinevere. . .” I tried all
her names. She couldn’t hear me. Or open her eyes. I couldn’t bring her back
again.
I have never felt so alone in my life.
Confession 13
I never told anyone how I dreamt of being cut open night after night. How a doctor with
latex gloves sliced me in half and went fishing in the rivers inside me, the rivers I still feel,
flowing at night through cool blue veins. Am I the only one who feels this? Those pearls like
tiny teeth, lodged so close to the bone. Everyone knows a girl is born with three pearls, one
for her past, one for her present, one for the future. He took only one. Why? you ask.
Because he wanted it. Because that’s what want does. And sometimes, I feel it again. The
pain of loss. The space where the pearl once was. The emptiness that replaced the girl I was.
Confession 17
In the dream, you’re a teenager again. Through the slats in the Venetian blinds, you see the
street where the painter lived, the girls you once envied walking home from school in their
plaid skirts and navy knee socks. A carful of boys drives slowly past, whistling and shouting.
You recognize the beautiful BB Jones with her thousand red curls, Cindy Peel, her slender
friend, and Melanie Dearborne with a permanent sneer on her face. They walk arm in arm,
their skirts rolled up, their long legs as white and slender as stalks
while you remain inside behind the sitting room window, there on the flowered loveseat,
posing, your head turned, one eyebrow raised, feeling as if ants are running up your legs.
Don’t move, the painter says. Please. And you don’t.
You look lovely, he adds, then brushes your hair back with his hand, arranging you just so as
the afternoon the light moves across your face, the potted plants, the blue walls, and his
paintbrush traces your cheeks, lips, collar bone.
This happened ages ago, you think, not wanting to see what happens next,
and you try to leave. To rise up and rush for the door—you can almost feel the sidewalk
beneath your bare feet. But you can’t move. The paint is still drying on your arms and legs
and face, holding you forever in that place.
Nin Andrews' most recent collection, The Last Orgasm, was published by Etruscan Press in 2020.