Bones

Do you think I'm insane? Like I got a couple screws loose? I ask you


Not in the way that anyone would actually be worried about you. You say back


We lay in my barren room that you hate. I stopped buying furniture when I realized the impermanence of things. I see my reflection in your eyes, looking at a person you created. I think about how fun I must be for you. How I kill your boredom. You stop my thoughts when you trace your finger over the stitches scar on my leg. There’s supposed to be bones in there. Sometimes it feels just like blood and dirt.


My mother, her mother, and her mothers mother used to say “only boring people get bored”. I crawl through glass, skin my knees, grit my teeth, scream, and wail, but I am never bored.


I live every single day like the world is going to end. I blow kisses at boys. I sing with girls. I say yes to everything. Only the sun can make my night end . Last night I danced like it was 6/6/06 when people believed the world was going to end. Last night I frantically spent $42 on an Uber to meet you at your apartment like it was 12/21/2012 when people believed the world was going to end.


Have you found anyone more interesting than me on your phone yet? I say kissing your eyelids.


You kiss me back in response. But, I’m afraid of your real answer. Maybe you’ve found a sensible girl. Maybe she is brunette. Maybe she has a corporate creative job like brand strategy for a modern kitchenware company that successfully breaks all conventional rules of traditional kitchenware. Maybe she wears a long linen dress to the farmers market. Maybe she quietly giggles at your jokes. Maybe she finds herself lost in thought. Maybe she tilts her head when she looks up at you. She is perfect. You are perfect. You are built from clay and ocean foam. You think before you speak. You breathe with ease. You keep your proverbs simple and sweet. But, you’re bored just like me. I wonder if we could be bored together.


It’s too cold for summer. My nails are manicured for once, french tips like how my hot cousins used to get them. Our mothers didn’t play with dolls with us. We had to find ways to cure our boredom. My cousins had to wrap their cardigans around their bare stomachs to hide their belly rings from the pious elders. They snuck out at night and skinny dipped with boys. They knew all the tricks to the perfect kiss. Nibble the bottom lip, tilt your head, close your eyes. Prophecies spoken through lip gloss and purple eyeshadow. They were never bored.


I lay on my back somewhere, anywhere. I grab your shoulders. You kiss my arms, I kiss your knees. I kiss you differently than I kiss anyone else. I kiss you like how a moth would kiss another moth. I want to kiss you in a way that finally ends the world. I asked for your name. I asked for your story. I asked you to kill my boredom. I asked for your number like it was 12/31/1999, when everyone believed the world was going to end. When we lay in bed, I inspect you like a single loose ant on the sidewalk. Squinting my eyes and nodding. Where are you off to? Can I come along?


My mothers mother was Miss Rockaway New Jersey 1953. She was spotted by a photographer after kneeling her teenage body into the sand at the beach one afternoon. She twirled through the walls of the returning veterans dance hall. My mother strolled down the boardwalk with ease. She was winked at by lifeguards while she stood with her hands on her bikini-clad hips. I remember I would gaze upon the hermit crabs in the storefront with painted shells in neon plastic cages. They look so stupid I’d think to myself. My mother, her mother and her mothers mother were eventually captured and tamed in pastel colored cages. I wonder if they were content when the boredom began.


When I really shut my eyes, when there’s static on the television, when the night begins to end, I wonder who I could be without these pointless conversations and pointless kisses. I only speak in stories. I only speak in jokes. I don’t know If I have ever told the truth. I always lie to you. I am always a message away from you. I am always at another party nearby. I will always say yes. I am so fun. I am the most fun person in the entire world.


I am the worst person in the entire world. I am the killer of forethought. I am the killer of introspection. I am the killer of progress. I am never bored. I am a doomsday prophecy. I demand that each day be different from the one before. I demand respect even as a worm in the dirt. I spend more money than I make. I am the prodigal son of Sunset Boulevard, limping home with blistered feet and black eyes. I don’t reap what I sow. I claim ignorance in the face of God. Oh, what’s this? The consequences to my actions? 


I want to see the beauty in the mundane. I want to reject idle hedonism. I want to kiss my Los Angeles Apparel model enemy. I think that would fix one or two things. I want to cook a big dinner. I want to hold hands. I want to break bread. I don’t want you to want me on my knees, I want you to want me to behave. Please stay, it’s too cold for summer. Please stay. I can’t be in this room with just myself. I can't let the beige carpet swallow my body and mind. I can’t rip out my thoughts with each chunk of hair. I can’t stop doing this. I can’t stop doing this.


My body is sculpted from dirt and sink water. My limbs are sewn together with tangled wires and shoelaces. My mouth is full of spit. My body contains crawl spaces for the women who have lived and died before me to curl up in. They sip on refrigerated wine and gossip about the unspoken rules of life. Memories resurface of my mother dancing in the grocery store aisle and pointing to the deer in the garden outside the kitchen window. I don’t think she is a killer. I don’t think she was bored either. I press my thumb to my thigh to feel the bones that are supposedly there.


I stare back up at you, sweet killer of my boredom. I came to you when the world was ending. But it just keeps going and going and going and going and going and going and going.


Do you want me to stay the night? You ask me


It’s too cold for summer. I say back




Erin Satterthwaite (AKA Suburban Cutie) is a writer based in Los Angeles. Her work can be found in Dream Boy Book Club, Spectra Poets, and Bug Gift Shop.