At Least I Have The Coffee

I sat in that diner with my eyes black. I was numb.

My nose was painted with dried blood.

The sweet older waitress kept filling my coffee mug and saying, "it gets better sweetie"

As sweet as she was, and knowing she was only trying to make me feel better, I felt nothing at all. Nothing until she said that same line over and over. Each time I felt angry. Like she was lying to me.

Things do not always get better. And she is 70 years old, ironically working the graveyard shift and refilling the coffee of a broken young girl who could barely afford 2 dollars for a cup of bitter coffee.

Bitter coffee was a good companion. It was hot enough to distract me from the painfully numb heart in my chest. It continued to be emptied and refilled.

I could tell that the two men that were grabbing a quick sobering bite to eat were curious as to what was wrong with me. They wanted to know my story, but were too lazy to read the scars on my skin.

Why would someone so young and beautiful try so hard to kill herself? They do not ever understand though. I never tried, I simply did. With every man who bought my body, and every slice I made in my flesh - I died.

I was dead a long time ago. So, with empty eyes and dried blood on my face, I sip my coffee and try to rest in my emptiness. I tried to convince myself that there was no one in this diner besides me and the sweet older waitress who kept refilling my coffee.

$3.00 on the counter and I am back in the harsh, cruel place that makes sure I never get my head above the gravel. The more cement I breathe in, the heavier my lungs, the easier it is to keep me down.

"Things will get better" like a broken record in my head. A seed of hope in a barren soul.

Maybe she knows more than I do, and maybe this hope is like drug. Smuggled into a hell that I will never escape.

At least I will always have the coffee.

-AshleyAnne