Girl in Pieces

In my dark room I wait for him, cleaned off, skin still hot from the bath, but he doesn’t come. I listen to the men drinking on the porch, to the far-off, hazy sound of a band finishing a set at Club Congress down the street, but there’s no knock at my door. I wait until it feels like my insides will explode, until I feel like a mass of fire, heat trickling from my pores, and then I get dressed, get on my lemon-yellow bicycle and ride to his house.

When he opens the door and sees me, he tucks the crook of his elbow in his hand, the smoke from his cigarette lifting dreamily into the air. “Where have you been?” he asks. Throaty voice, amused eyes. Then he takes my hand, leads me inside.