Flammable

I'm never cold anymore.

I used to always be cold because everyone says I don't eat enough , but now I'm never cold because of the angry sword that always keeps me warm, and I am never lonely as well.

I wake up next to a warm body and the smell of cologne I like and I am angry.

I lay next to Alto, and I am angry, because I know what he has done, and I am stuck, stuck in this stupid brown house, with its stupid brown furniture, and its stupid brown floors, and I am now stupid too.

He is sleeping, one of his heavy arms on my arm, snoring like the old man he is, and I am angrier with myself than I am with him because what did I expect? I let myself get attached, and now here I am, angry and stupid, just like him.

I stare at the palm leaves on the comforter and I try to calm myself, because lately whenever I get angry I have started setting things on fire. My shoes. My hair. My heart.

I consider setting the bed ablaze as he sleeps in it, listening to his screams, and we can burn together, die together, as I hold him down, like I did last night, except this time it will be a different kind of pleasure, and I will enjoy it, even more, this time his screams will be even louder.

I lay in bed all day and he asks me what's wrong and I ignore him.

He returns home and I am still in bed and I continue to ignore him.

He possibly knows that I know but Alto says nothing of the matter.

He assumes I am in a mood , one of those things that happens when I am someone else for a few days, weeks, sometimes months, I am not here, leave a note, please come back later.

I am not sure if it is day or night because it always day in this stupid, hot, place, and lay on the bed, naked, wishing I was cold, still never lonely, and my thoughts are interrupted by the angry stupid man that calls himself my boyfriend and tells me I should at least put on some underpants.

I ignore him.

He sits on the bed next to me and asks me what is wrong, what can I do, and I turn away, continuing to ignore him, yet he drones on, and I do not understand why he pretends to love me. This business contract would be easier if we were more honest with each other.

I fall asleep, and when I wake up again I am wearing green boxers.

My cheeks are on fire and now I have no choice but to leave the bed.

I'm still not here, so since I'm not here I don't have to worry about the things that everyone else has to worry about. I am tired even though I have done nothing but sleep, so I sit to pee, and this makes me irrationally angry again.

While sitting there, in the quiet of the bathroom that smells like peach soap, I wonder why I am always so angry. I know why I am angry with the stupid idiot who was nice enough to put on my boxers and guilt trip me so now I have to get out of bed. I don't know why I'm angry with myself.

I smoke on the balcony and I am angry at the suns, always there, never letting me feel quite right, and I am slightly happy as I notice I might be able to scoot myself through the gaps in the railing, but the railing gaps are wide anyway, and therefore I am too wide, so I return to being angry and smoking.

My boyfriend returns in the day-night with flowers and I acknowledge him after two and a half days.

I shower and I get dressed for bed but I do not understand the point of getting dressed because I tend to take my shirt off anyway. I'm always hot, and I hate it.

I miss being cold.

It's the only way I know I'm doing something right.

Almost every night Alto pretends that he doesn't want me and tonight I really do not want him and the disappointment is obvious on his face and it makes me feel a little good inside.

I want to be mean because he is mean to me until it is time to get something from me.

He later changes tactics and is now someone I do not recognize as he tells me that he cares about me and other flowery words as he holds me close from behind. I mumble words of approval because I like this version of him, I like the attention, I am a little less angry, but it is still not enough.

He asks me what he has done wrong and I tell him it is one of the things I do , and he never asks again.

Another morning comes, and he leaves again.

I am not sure what he does, and when I ask he tells me, and then I don't want to know, because it involves a lot of dead people, but he insists that I will have to come to work with him eventually if we are to continue our relationship.

Relationship.

I sit in the bathtub, the nice one, not the ugly one on the right side of the room, but the newer one with the jets, and I am angry because now he says we are in a relationship after months of refusing to admit he is attracted to me, and then refusing to admit that I am not lying about my family , that I am not crazy, lastly, he says we are in a relationship after putting his dick into others whenever he wants.

He thinks I don't know but his sister told me when she was drunk, and I was tipsy in the swimming pool, drinking margaritas and complaining about him. She told me she was surprised I was fine with an open relationship, and I never knew I was in one.

I am not in a relationship, open or closed.

He is my permanent client , I work daily, usually at night, with plenty of benefits, and he is lying to the both of us, and I am stupid because I lied to myself too and I am hurt. I am hurt, cold, and finally lonely because the water has gone cold, the jet timer has turned off and now I know that something is working, I just don't know what it is.

I leave my room on the third day and I am dressed in whatever I see first. The shorts are too big, the shirt is too small, but they are my clothes, and I make a mental note to find someone to take care of it for me as I walk down the brown halls.

I am carrying the angry sword, and the employees in the house eye me warily because they think I am going to kill them but I do not care enough to do so. The sword tells me that I should hurt someone.

I ignore him, the angry sword is always telling me to do something wrong. I can do bad things on my own. I am not against the suggestions he makes; I just don't like being told what to do.

I hate the wallpaper and so does the sword.

We find a mutual disagreement, so I lift my arm up, pressing the tip of the old sword against the wall, tearing a long streak into it as I walk down the hallway knowing that there will be no punishment. I smile, the first smile I have had in days as the sword snickers, causing him to vibrate, leaving strange zigzag patterns on the wall.

Every day I see what else I can get away with, and every day Alto lets me do more.

I ask Adonis why, and he tells me he thinks that Alto feels sorry for me.

There is nothing to feel sorry for. I was born blessed. What is there to feel sorry for?

The sword suggests that if I want to really bother him, I should do what he does.

"Kill people," I ask out loud, while purposefully eyeing Steve, the employee I do not like as he passes by, and he walks a little faster, keeping his eyes to the ground.

The sword tells me that I should put my own appendage wherever I please. That it makes no sense to copulate with someone who refuses to give you a child.

"He can make one, he just doesn't want to," I mumble. "I don't want one either."

The sword tells me what is the point of sex without children and I feel like I am talking to a very old man who does not believe in protection nor anything outside the tiny square his mind is.

The idea is now in my head.

Not the baby.

The idea is now in my head to put my own appendage wherever I please because I am hurt, and it is not fair, and I know life is not fair, but I have tried so hard for so long, and it is not fair that he can do whatever he wants and I cannot, I am inside this brown house, always, his stupid decoration, but I am stupid, because what did I expect?

I tell myself to have no more expectations and I return to my room, having torn up several hallways of wallpaper, hoping that they will let me choose the new color because I do not like the current one.

Rosaline is in our bedroom, and I smile again, as I hide the angry sword in the dresser drawer. She is lovely and nice, and I do not want her to work here any longer, she is not stupid nor angry. Rosaline wears the woman's uniform for the employees, a nice pale pink and we talk, because we used to work together.

She tells me I am worried about you, you should not be in a relationship with a dangerous man.

We are not in a relationship.

Rosaline turns red as I explain to her that it is a business agreement and that if anyone thinks otherwise then it is a lie. It is more money than working here. I tell her, stick with college, don't be like me, I can't even read.

She tells me it's never too late.

I feel so horrible for considering putting my appendage in her, but she is so nice, her black hair so long, but I realize I am crazy, I have returned from my trip, I am myself again. My hair is all over the place, I am constantly pulling up my too-big shorts and my too-tight shirt has a stain and I am crazy.

I ask her to leave and I become proper.

The next week I stick my appendage where I please, various times, but I stop because Alto will never know, so what is the use of doing this when I will never tell him? I do not love Rosaline in that way, and neither does she, and the sex is no longer exciting, but it is very good.

A few months later she quits and I am happy that she has left the stupid, brown, house, filled with angry people because she is not angry nor stupid.

The next week after she leaves Alto wants our arrangement to become permanent, written on paper, and I say yes because I am stupid as well.