Everything Must Go

by Jenny Fran Davis

  I remember talking for a long time—him talking, mostly, in a little whisper, about how he thought I was the most fascinating girl in the world, and how everyone across the country agreed with him.

  I remember how he leaned in to kiss me, and I remember that his lips felt slightly cold, but soft, and also incredibly hot.

  I remember him taking off his little round glasses and setting them gently on the bedside table.

  I remember how slow he was, tracing my stomach and ribs with two fingers and sighing and saying it was the softest thing he’d ever felt (thanks, Embryolisse Lait-Crème Concentré).

  And kissing my collarbone, nibbling slightly, making me giggle.

  I remember thinking that this—Elijah’s loving me, or at least wanting to—was the only thing I’d ever wanted, and how now that it was happening—actually happening—I could only watch it, as though I were one of the moths fluttering around the light.

  I remember him asking, like the good feminist he is, before taking off any of his clothing or mine. I remember nodding. I remember meaning it.

  I remember placing my wrists on his chest and it feeling warm.

  I remember wanting him to see the little space between my breasts and my waist.

  I remember the surge of wetness and wondering if my lace underwear would have to be dry-cleaned.

  I remember wanting to dive under the covers when he unhooked my bra but instead sliding under him and wrapping him around me and tracing his back with my fingernails.

  I remember us laughing.

  I remember him telling me I was beautiful, over and over, and interesting, again and again, and special, and my body reacting—like opening and expanding. (Ew, I’m making myself want to vom.) He called me a swan.

  I remember falling asleep, and at four in the morning I remember him grabbing me closer from behind, and feeling the warmth of his breathing on my neck, and my eyes opened, and I looked at the wall for a few seconds and thought I saw God.

  Ugh, I can’t believe I just WROTE that. I’m such a freaking cliché. Who am I even BECOMING?

  It’s also so weird, because I thought I was kind of becoming someone else, all these months that I didn’t see him. I mean, I was still waiting for him, obviously, but, like, I was changing on my own, too. And then he came back and it was like I was my old self again, which felt both comfortable and a little strange.

  But then he LEFT. He left me in the guest bed while he brushed his teeth and staggered into his clothes, and the space where he had been lying was still warm. And he threw all his stuff into his little bag and opened the door, letting a gust of cold air in that sent me shivering underneath the quilt again.

  “Elijah?” I asked, trying to keep my voice from shaking.

  He paused in the doorway.

  “Aren’t you going to stay for the day? So we can take the last Miss Tulip picture?”

  He turned around to face me, and I immediately saw on his face that things were very, very wrong. He wasn’t smiling, for one, and in fact looked pained, like he was trying to find a good way to tell me that my grandmother had died.

  “I don’t think that’s a good idea,” he said.

  I didn’t want to ask him why not, but it came out anyway, in a thin gasp.

  He just shook his head. “I don’t think I can do this, Flora,” he said.

  “Do what?”

  He took a deep breath. “See you.” Another breath. “Be with you.”

  “Why not?” My throat felt swollen to three times its size. I crawled into the space between the reality of it happening—his leaving me—and my understanding it. I detached myself completely.

  He closed the door, securing himself inside with a dull thud, but he still didn’t face me.

  “It’s complicated. This … what we did … it’s all complicated.”

  “Complicated? How?” Now my throat was really closing, and my face felt hot enough to explode off my neck.

  He wasn’t looking at me. His head faced the closed door, and he peered desperately out the window, where the sun shone meekly. He didn’t want to be in this room with me. His bags were packed; his coat was on.

  “I didn’t mean for this to happen. I’m so proud of you for being here. I’m sorry for confusing you.” He delivered these three lines with three twists of his neck, none of which awarded me eye contact.

  He pushed the door open again, letting in a patch of sunlight for a second, and then let it close behind him.

  And then I was alone, and the room looked hollow and gray, and I couldn’t decide whether to laugh or sob. I chose neither, and instead swaddled myself in the quilt and stared at the dark ceiling.

  I didn’t realize I was still naked—I’d been naked! In bed with a BOY!—until I put one foot on the cold wood floor. The fire had gone out late the night before, and he hadn’t lit another.

  I feel so used. He took everything he wanted—photos, sex—and BAILED. I can’t shake the feeling that he signed up for the Tutorial thing just to find a swanlike sixteen-year-old muse. My throat is as tight as a fist again. I’m not even that swanlike, if you really think about it. My neck is of average length, I think. And I guess I’m pale, or whatever, but lots of people at Bowen are pale. Why did he seek me out? Was it my shoes?

  I almost can’t blame Sam for writing the thing. I was a complete fucking mess after Elijah left. But whenever I think of him writing that thing in the Quare Times, my chest gets all shaky and I need to sit down. It’s okay. I don’t really need him as a friend. I have Lael and India and Cora, but I can’t possibly tell India and Cora any of this—they just would never understand it, because they still think the only reason I’m at Quare is because Bowen wasn’t interesting or exciting enough. Nobody will understand this. I did write India a long letter, explaining everything, but I never sent it, because she just wouldn’t get it, you know? She’d be all, “Why are you letting this skinny hipster guy ruin your life?”

  Over winter break, when everyone saw me all disheveled, they were like, “Don’t go back to that place! Bowen will take you back in a heartbeat!” But honestly, I’ve never felt more sure of something. I don’t even know why—Quare should be the last place I want to be right now. But I can’t just fucking leave because of what he did to me. I’m not going anywhere.

  ***************************start here*************************249(259)

  Attempt 10

  January 29

  Elijah Huck

  245 West 107th Street

  New York, NY 10025

  Elijah,

  This is what I wrote in my journal last April: “Just as I’ve loved you since before I knew it, I’ll love you beyond when I stop knowing it. I want to get closer to you than skin.”

  Well, we got closer than skin. But maybe not. Can you ever get past your skin? Did we get past ours? Even when you were asking and I was saying yes, YES, always yes?

  Flora Goldwasser

  Elective: Feminist Forms

  January 29

  Short response: “Girls with Eating Disorders”

  Roxane Gay’s short story “Girls With Eating Disorders” associates abuse with foolishness, disturbing our notion of the traditional trauma narrative. In the story, the protagonist, Peter, dates solely women with eating disorders: “He preferred the tall girls who hovered around 105 and spent most of their time sucking their bodies toward their spines.” Peter’s misogyny is evident; this is nothing new. It is the depiction of Vivian, Peter’s current anorexic and bulimic girlfriend, which disturbs our notion of trauma: Vivian is not just an innocent victim, but also a fool.

  After she prepares a milk shake and drinks the whole thing, Gay writes that Vivian “lovingly rubbed her hands over her food baby belly and waddled around. She smiled for a brief moment as she imagined what she would look like if she were pregnant with Peter’s baby and how she would raise that baby to be skinny and beautiful.”

  Vivian’s shallowness and vapidity are evident; rather than address or even recogniz
e her serious eating disorder, she focuses on her one-day baby’s weight in a half-baked way. Vivian is a one-dimensional character whose disease turns her hollow rather than complex: it is all we see of Vivian, perhaps all there is to her at all.

  At the end of the story, Vivian and Peter agree to have “a tiny little baby,” and Vivian is overcome with fondness for Peter. Even though he talks with his mouth full, and Vivian “f[inds] this repulsive,” she resolves to withhold judgment, deciding: “Life was repulsive.” Vivian seems to surrender here to the nastiness of life—her eating disorders; her possibly abusive relationship with Peter, who emotionally manipulates her; her messy, secret escapades in the bathroom with other women—and she chooses to live it anyway, somewhat foolishly, merely because of the attention Peter gives her. Vivian trades everything she has—happiness, dignity, and even her physical body—for Peter’s approval. She is the ultimate brainless, mindless fool. Should we then pity her?

  COMMENTS

  Flora, you seem to be suggesting that Gay draws a line between victimhood and foolishness. Gay’s choice to portray Vivian as a fool for trading “dignity” for “Peter’s approval” rather than as a victim, as you argue, “disturbs our notion of trauma,” which typically isolates and insulates the victim from any blame. Does Gay impose a hierarchy on foolishness and victimhood? To me, both seem equally disempowering: to be cast as either a hapless victim or an utter fool (as though for allowing herself to be taken advantage of) denies women both autonomy and agency to write their own narratives. —Pearl

  To: India Katz-Rosen

  From: Cora Shimizu-Stein

  Subject: Flora

  February 1, 9:18 p.m.

  Babe,

  I just got a Flora letter. She’s avoiding the topic altogether. We need to get to the bottom of this. You didn’t get the letter, did you? The one that was supposed to explain everything but mysteriously disappeared in transit?

  Cora

  To: Cora Shimizu-Stein

  From: India Katz-Rosen

  Subject: Re: Flora

  February 1, 9:20 p.m.

  No, I never got the letter!! Don’t you think I’d tell you if I had?! Blanca’s on the lookout. It’s like I’m waiting for a college acceptance letter, or something.

  UPS shipment form for the vending machine

  UPS FEBRUARY 4

  ATTN: CITIZENS’ VENDING

  PHONE: (800) 764-0912

  DELIVERY NOTIFICATION

  INQUIRY FROM: PIRANHA VENDING, LLC

  506 CENTRAL INDUSTRIAL DRIVE

  MARLOE, MICHIGAN 48315

  SHIPMENT TO: FLORA GOLDWASSER

  PIGEONHOLE 44

  THE QUARE ACADEMY

  2 QUARE ROAD

  MAIN STREAM, NY 12497

  SHIPMENT NUMBER 889766

  ACCORDING TO OUR RECORDS, 1 PARCEL WAS DELIVERED ON 02/04 AT 1:12 P.M. THE SHIPMENT WAS SIGNED FOR BY F. GOLDWASSER AS FOLLOWS:

  FLORA M. GOLDWASSER

  To: Flora Goldwasser

  From: Pearl Bishop

  Subject: your essay

  February 4, 8:42 p.m.

  Flora,

  I just took a look at the first draft of your Roxane Gay essay. I wrote some comments on the paper, but I thought I’d reach out to ask: Is there anything you’d like to discuss?

  I’ll also add—and I’m not sure if you’re aware of this—that I hold a PhD in adolescent psychology, and Miriam has asked me to step in to see if you’d like to come to her office and have a chat—the three of us. Please do let me know.

  Pearl

  To: Pearl Bishop

  From: Flora Goldwasser

  Subject: Re: your essay

  February 4, 9:56 p.m.

  Pearl,

  I’m okay, thanks!

  Flora

  To: Miriam Row

  From: Juna Díaz

  Subject: Flora

  February 5, 4:03 p.m.

  Dear Miriam,

  As you know, Flora’s been going through a tough time lately. I’ve taken it upon myself as her roommate to schedule an appointment for her at Planned Parenthood in Woodstock for this Wednesday afternoon. Would you be able to drive us there (it was their only opening for weeks)? She’s still pretty down-seeming, and I’m wondering if someone there would be able to talk to her about any emotional or physical feelings she’s been having.

  Thanks,

  Juna

  My application for an independent study

  NAME OF APPLICANT: Flora Goldwasser

  FACULTY ADVISER: Susan María Velez, playwright in residence

  STUDENT MENTOR: Dean Elliot, master player of Guild

  GENRE OF PROJECT: Playwriting; performance art

  DESCRIPTION OF PROJECT: I will be writing a play that incorporates performance art. Loosely speaking, the play will be about Ursula, a girl from a private school in Manhattan who gets pregnant in her junior year and is sent to a community for wayward teens in rural Pennsylvania. There, she’s dared to deflower the innocent, virginal Caleb in order to win the approval of her classmates, into whose secret society she’s desperate to be admitted.

  GOALS FOR THE PROJECT: The play will be about an hour long, and actors will perform it at the end of the semester.

  TIME PER WEEK DEVOTED TO PROJECT: ten hours

  Letter from Juna to her girlfriend, Thee, published here with Juna’s permission

  Theodora Sweet

  1330 Corrida De Agua

  Santa Fe, NM 87507

  February 6

  Thee,

  I told Flora about my sexuality last night. It feels good to finally be able to tell people. After these past six weeks, I feel so empowered. We were talking about this celibacy pledge that’s been going around among the guys in a show of solidarity with Flora. Sam Chabot—the guy who wrote the thing in the Quare newspaper—was one of the first to sign it, but I’m of the mind that he’s just trying to get into this other girl’s—Marigold’s—pants. After all, what’s more irresistible to a girl than a guy who doesn’t want to sleep with her—and for feminist reasons, no less?

  “Don’t you think we should give Sam a little credit?” Flora asked, in a rather Stockholm syndrome-y way. Or maybe she was being sarcastic? We were lying in the dark, both in our beds; it’s really the only time that I sense Flora feels she can be vulnerable.

  Oh, Thee. I don’t want to be annoying, and play psychiatrist to Flora (if you know anything about the psychiatric field and its historical treatment of women, particularly women of color, you know it’s not a pretty picture). But I wish I could help her, you know? I just hate that she’s suffering in silence. What Elijah did, and what Sam did, make me so mad I could break something.

  But anyway, back to our conversation.

  I honestly thought no, we shouldn’t “give Sam a little credit,” but I decided to modulate my tone out of respect for her healing process.

  “I suppose I am being harsh,” I allowed. And then, because it seemed like an in: “It’s been an odd time for me to be thinking about men.”

  I’d really set her up for that one. Flora asked why that was.

  I took a breath. “I’ve begun to have some questions,” I said.

  “About Sam?” she asked.

  “About me,” I said. “About my sexuality.” I tried to keep my tone light, but I think my voice wavered a little bit. It IS hard to tell people—you were right.

  Flora didn’t really say all that much, however. She’s still in the trance she’s been in for the past two weeks, the one where she sits on her bed, wearing her silk turban and doing her homework (sorry, ugh, shell speak again). Like, all day. Besides, I get that I’ve been presenting as more queer these days, so it’s possible that she wasn’t exactly shocked.

  Still, I was emboldened by her response. I felt a yearning to
reach out to her, to let her know that I was still thinking about what happened between her and Elijah. I really do feel for her, if Elijah hurt her, as Sam certainly implied he did. I’ve even stopped checking the Miss Tulip site for updates—in protest.

  “Can I ask you a question?” I said.

  “Sure?”

  I had to choose my words very carefully.

  “Are you ready to talk about what happened when Elijah visited?”

  She answered, though, immediately.

  “No,” she said. “I’d really prefer not to discuss it. And I’d really appreciate it if you’d stop talking to people about it.”

  “Who have I been talking about it to?” I asked, taken aback.

  “You know,” she said. “The Feminist Underground.”

  I’ll admit that I resented that, a bit. The Feminist Underground is a grassroots project designed to support all women, but I guess, now that I think about it, we have been the tiniest bit, well, aggressive in our support of Flora in this particular case. I mean, I’m proud of the way we’ve been encouraging her to narrativize her experience outside of the neat framework that the assault/consent dichotomy presents. But in the moment, I just wanted her to tell me what exactly had happened. I just wanted to know so that maybe she could begin to heal. My nonviolent communication skills are getting so much better! I just wanted to help!

  “Flora,” I said, struggling to stay calm, “I know better than anyone that it’s easier to deny something than it is to look it in the face. But one of these days, it’s going to consume you.”

  “Juna,” she said. The moment hung between us. “Fuck off.”

  I gasped quietly. Then I turned away from her and pretended to go to sleep, but really I couldn’t sleep all night. I feel so conflicted about this. Sam’s accusation was so vague, but at the same time, he was Flora’s best friend here—why would he have published a lie? Is it possible that indeed nothing happened between them? Why would Sam have taken a shot at Elijah’s reputation like that unprovoked? Was the society article even about Flora?