mature

if we were having coffee, you’d probably tell me how “mature” i am. for drinking such an “adultish” drink such as this.

if we were having coffee, i’d probably be choking the drink down, wondering if i could ask for whipped cream and chocolate syrup and two tablespoons of sugar and milk chocolate chips and some sort of really sweet creamer and not have you scoff and tell me how “childish” i am and how i “need to learn to grow up.” if i ended up asking, i would probably laugh and say something like “oh, but i don’t want to grow up, not if it means i have to give up all this sugar” in response. you would laugh. you might tell your husband later that night, gushing about just how silly i am. i am so stinking silly, i would tell myself sarcastically before bursting into giggles, and then tears, curled up against the safety of my concrete floor and denim rug.

if we were having coffee, i would bring my stim toy and mess with it quietly beneath the table, where you could not see it. you do not need another reason to call me childish, now do you? even if it is only for my anxiety. my anxiety caused by this entire metaphorical situation. you would think me childish for needing the stimulation, and would laugh at me for having any anxieties whatsoever--because i am so very safe with you, aren’t i?

if we were having coffee, you’d probably ask me how i am. i’d say something along the lines of my being “fine” and laugh to myself, quietly, thinking of the image with text i sent to someone who i’d much rather be talking to than you.

if we were having coffee, i would ask how you were doing, too. and i would sit alone, nodding and smiling, pretending i am such an “adult” for understanding all of the things i shouldn’t need to understand. things like how your taxes are coming along and things like how your extremely-gross-novel-that-makes-me-want-to-vomit story that you’re reading is going. i would nod and ask questions at all the right times. i would make light jokes of the things you don’t really like, if only so that you might be happy about them later.

if we were having coffee, you’d probably ask me what i’ve been writing of late. i would not tell you of the multiple stories and ideas i’ve been baking in the oven that is my brain. i would not tell you of my poetry, either. you’d want to see the poems. and you’d wonder why i’d say no. and i would not have the heart, nor the courage, to say that i write so much about you and that i am angry at you and that i do not like the way you treat me and that i am trying, so very badly, to move on. to learn to say “no” to you. to learn, to learn, to learn. i would not say any of this. i would change the subject--to taxes, maybe.

if we were having coffee, i don’t know what i’d say to fill the space between the things i can’t say and the things i don’t have the heart, nor the courage, to say.

if we were having coffee, i would recall all the things you would say and i would store them up and stew on them, before hating myself for nine consecutive days afterwards. i would probably write twenty-three poems about it the day of and the day after. and i’d write so many in the days following. and i would feel more exhausted than i do at the moment, only thinking of even having coffee with you.

if we were having coffee, i would begin to hate the word “mature.”