We stand. Two pillars. I am taller than you because my arms are over my head. If I dropped them, I would be just a few inches shorter. I have grown, even in the last months, because I asked.
We are two feet apart, exactly, unmeasured. It can only be felt, maybe heard. If you listen to your body, you can feel me already. Nearby. Exactly two feet away. My back is towards you.
You step closer to me and I can feel it, though you do not touch me and I do not see. You raise your arms in a closed loop, over your head, then slip the loop over my head. Trapped, you think. You do not know what I think. Your arms do not touch me, but hold me. You think this is almost enough.
I begin to wiggle. Think of a fish caught and forced into hot air or a dog held for a little too long. Slippery and unusually strong. I start to wriggle wriggle wriggle.
Still no contact is made.
Instinctively, your arms tighten, drawing me in by the waist. I bend at the hips, into you. The warm is exciting. Exciting, except I have not stopped wiggling. You wish I would, but it’s only gotten worse. My arms are still over my head, and I’m trembling in addition to the writhing. I am now writhing.
You cling tighter, thinking about what the fuck you are supposed to do. Maybe this is not it, not want you want, not love. My legs give out in convulsions and you are holding me up; you are holding me. But I have not stopped wriggling. Wiggling. Writhing.
You wonder if I am oiled, slippery as a frog, but this is just my skin and I am just moving the way I know how. Shaking, thrashing, squirming. You suspect every joint in me has dislocated and every bone has rubberized. Your arms are hurting my ribs and my back and my everything. You are hurting me now but you will not let go. And my arms are extended out from my head, but this is now below, and I am writhing.
Eventually, you drop me. Release me from the embrace. Once my heat becomes too much and it becomes clear I will not stop. I flop to the ground. And you laugh now, despite. Because that is a fish or an eel or a snake, and it most certainly is not anything more. Not me.
And I wiggle and wriggle and writhe.
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