Fridge

The fridge is nearly empty, and I feel a deep sadness. Not for me — I still have trouble with feelings being ‘for me’ (except, sometimes, for visceral, selfish feelings about defending my own isolation and routine) — but for the only man I thought was worth taking care of, before I realized that I could be him, too.

You were such a good girl.

True — an empty fridge, without half a weekend’s labor of hand-crafted meals, neatly packaged with whimsical sticky notes — an empty fridge would have been unthinkable to her, a good girl. A girl too good to be true.

I can’t say ‘woman’, maybe because I’m already infantilizing myself with the shame again, or maybe because ‘girl’ is less terrifying and at least a little closer to the increasingly un-womanly form I indulge myself in now (I say things like ‘indulge’ a lot, when I really just mean that I feel normal and good. I guess the Catholicism never really goes away).

You were such a good girl, and he deserves better. You used to take care of him.

I swing the fridge door a little and wonder what that sort of care — fawning, ludicrous, and extreme — would feel like on the other end. Probably a lot less than it felt like in my head, if the silence was any indication. Not too good to be true, but certainly too exhausting. Not taken for granted, I hope, but certainly bordering on the especially insidious marriage of codependence and complacency.

Still, I am sad for him. He deserves better.

I indulge — no, it doesn’t have to be that word, does it? — er, I entertain the thought of ‘him’ referring to ‘me’ as well.

He deserves better.