Two Lined Stick

Five years ago I constructed a fake library card out of poorly-cut cardboard, and cheap laminate from the cover of my two-inch binder. I remember when I took three hundred from my drawer, a gift for a “shopping spree” with light-hearted friends I kept in the dark.

The other two hundred came from his parents, even though they knew he didn’t need a new computer. I remember when my mother banged her fist against our peeled bathroom door that my body held shut, after she saw the box with the two-lined stick hidden in my blue leather purse. I knew she would check the shampoo bottles, so I flattened it between my thighs. The night we stayed up to catch the six AM train my mother told me insurance would cover it.

I denied. I did not need a “procedure” for my only Saturday plan was to go on a shopping spree with my virgin friends. Four round trips, fourteen years young. I remember the morning I waited with Sarah, who didn’t believe in what I was doing. Five years later, I am still too afraid to ask if her beliefs have changed. I remember the pale blue room crammed with somber women who had no choice but to listen to the scene selection screen of a two-star movie. They shuffled out one by one in some cruel order until I was alone. “I want my mom,” I cried, as they pushed foreign fluid through my veins to lower my heart rate. And I remember waking up choking on saltines they shoved down my throat, it was some time of day. I remember the sweet blood that proved it was finally over, the sweet blood that allowed me to catch-up on my homework.