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Whoever said beauty is only skin-deep? What an idiot. She was probably a rotten-hearted malicious feminist. Beauty doesn't just lay over someone like a drape or a cape or white cloth over summer house furniture. You banal self-insecurity, no. Skin is the bulb that beauty shines through.
And I love it when it shines too bright. It's not safe for the eyes, to be around for too long. Not safe for the heart either, but one never forgets it.
Last year, since I don't know when - not so long, two single hairs grew on my back, one on each shoulder blade. They were both the same length, about an inch, and the rest was smooth skin in every direction. My entire back, there wasn't another hair on it (except sparse sycronized clumps on my neck just below the hairline, but that doesn't count of course), and it was silky smooth like a seal, like baby's skin.
Girls would say, "Ew, what is that?" and pluck them both out, one at a time.
"Those are my angel wings! How'm I supposed to get back to heaven now?"
She'd laugh and I'd bite her soft on the neck so as not to leave a mark, and we'd make an afternoon of it.
I never cried. I was never sad or mad when they were plucked. They always grew back.
Then I went to Bali. A girl with a tender accent plucked them one by one. "These are like angel wings," she said, "on such a smooth back."
"How'm I supposed to get back to heaven now?"
"To heaven?" She laughed and bit me soft on the neck so as not to leave a mark and we made a night and a morning of it.
Heaven...
It was a small room in Bali. One bed, one bathroom, one fan. One desk with a chair and a mirror.
"Heaven..." she whispered in my ear. Then she turned and bent at the waist, both elbows on the desk, her breasts kissed the wood. She smiled at me in the mirror and said, "You're too bad to be from heaven." I held her in a tight grip, hard, just above the hips and she made a chorus sing in Argentine.
I've been back a month now and still have no wings on my shoulders. They won't grow back.
It's on a swingset I realize that it's not two wings I have now, but two angels to lead me, one on each side swinging with me. My two halves, I have.
Save a Capricorn.
See Aquarius.
I had, I had.
I follow them now, I just hope they don't lose me. Not ever.
What frightens me is that there's no feeling at all. She said it first, and there wasn't much thought to it for me to agree. It just wasn't there. That will, that knowing, nothing. So we smiled and hugged and she got out of the car. It was an "oh well," not some to-the-bone heart-shattering sadness. Only then did it dawn on me that I didn't really love her. I just liked how pretty she was. How sometimes witty she was. But there was too much silence, too much effort, no click. We aren't who we used to be.
Jordan said I'd changed.
She's right, I guess.
Still, it was a pretty fuckin' good movie, Gravity. No matter how high you are, it's what always brings you back down to Earth. Keep your feet on the ground, you.
