Kat

15

nothing is unbeautiful
(august 2014)

pt. 1

______Nothing in this world is as vivid as his kitchen at one in the morning, warm and small, four white stools at the table- three carved glasses full of tequila, one for me, two for him, and a jug of orange juice to share. He shoots the booze like water and I almost die with each sip. He makes me eat bread to hold the alcohol down. The entire world is beautiful and I believe in innate happiness- he's sitting in the chair next to me, facing me, and he and I are both so human and im laughing because nothing is unbeautiful. I tell him, 'earlier, when we were watching Toy Story and you were laying next to me, I loved you.' He cries and tells me he's never cried from happiness before. 'You were so small and so complicated and I loved you,' I repeat. I pause and watch his cat, seven weeks old, bat at her brother with one tiny paw. 'But I haven't said I love you yet, okay?' 'Okay,' he says. He loves me but I wont let him say it. He has a red metal coffee maker and a cupboard full of power bars and Hostess cupcakes. He drinks almost a gallon of orange juice a day. The walls of his room are dark blue, with four guitars, a bass, and a ukulele hanging from them. Hidden inside the acoustic is a bag of purple diesel, pungent and sweet smelling. He has a daft punk poster and a Matisse print and there's a note on his wall that says, 'today you should DO SOMETHING!'
______The whole house is dark, save for one light, the one in the kitchen, shining on us both - it feels like we're at the center of the world. It feels for a moment like everything matters. Nothing is unimportant. It is one in the morning and you are fifteen and drunk, sitting in a boy's kitchen, and nothing is unbeautiful.

pt. 2

______She was two pounds, ten ounces when she was born. We named her after Amelia Earhart, in case she needs to fly away.
______She grew up to be Amy, twelve years old and standing five feet even in brown slacks at the door of the kitchen. Her bangs have grown past her eyebrows, a blonde fringe quickly encroaching on the inky softness of eyes, and her fingers, which have not yet outgrown their childlike thickness, are heavy with the frosting of a Hostess cupcake. She uses the heels of her hands to prop her small body into a white wooden stool and leans her elbows on the counter as she licks her fingers, one by one, methodically. I watch Amelia, Amy, as she does this. She does this every evening and I have yet to be unfazed by the miracle that a human is. She is so small and so complicated and no part of her vast soul is unbeautiful. She worldessly climbs up onto the windowsill, stretches, opens the cabinet with an unholy creak and reaches sideways for a mug, one leg swinging through the air as her whole body strains. She doesn't let me help her. Once she has in her hand one white mug, she hops down from her post and fills it to the absolute brim with orange juice. She gives a slight smile, as if out of victory, and drinks it with a loud slurping sound. I have been alive for thirty-nine years and I have never seen anything more glorious.
______Amelia does not need to fly away just yet.
______Amelia, no part of you is unbeautiful. It is eight in the evening and you are happy to have a hostess cupcake and half a liter of juice- there's still a bit of light at the horizon, vaguely purple and struggling. You acknowledge me with a nod of the head just as you leave for your room and no part of you is unbeautiful.

pt. 3

______The only things left in our house are emptiness and a chair. It's more of a stool, really; a person sitting in it couldn't touch the ground with her feet. It was painted white years ago, but it's been worn down enough to let wood grain show through. I'm leaning against the wall across from it, picking my teeth with one gold earring, seventy-six years old.
______I haven't said a meaningful thing to another person in years- maybe I've run out of meaningful things to say, maybe I've gotten too old. The hallway's whistling right now- this house is turned into an organ by the wind, it murmurs, it sighs. My house, at least, has something to say.
______I haven't said a meaningful thing to another person in years- I'd like to fix that. I'd like to say something to you. I'll tell you the only thing I've ever really learned:
______No part of this world is unbeautiful.