The Mare

Silvia

Crushing that bread and pretending she doesn’t know! And that look — not only in her eyes and her mouth, but her body, the way she moves. Doesn’t she know everybody sees it? Why does she think those girls hate her? She’s conceited, spoiled by that sad rotten-belly woman.

I leaned out the window and saw the top of her head, like a little dog on the porch, turning to look at the people going past. People playing music, the girl with her red head scarf across the way, talking on her cell with her baby in her arms. I looked and I remembered sitting on the stoop in my aunt’s lap, watching a storm moving through the mountains, heavy clouds pouring dark rain, coming toward us but me safe in the lap. My mother looking with faraway eyes; half her body was somewhere else. Not that girl in the red scarf; she is right here with the music banging in her body, shouting in her phone, walking up and down…I remember music too, coming down the street on a summer night. My boyfriend coming on his bike. Vegetable smells in the heat. The bell on his rusty purple bike. My mother’s prayers when she thought I couldn’t hear. Please don’t let me hurt my child. I love her so much. The horses walking in the street.

Well, it’s her time of life too. Her body’s an alarm about to go off; she’ll be needing her own room.