"What are you reading?"
My mother is standing here -- here! -- in my bedroom. My bedroom.

Nobody is allowed in my bedroom. Nobody.

No.

Body.

Nobody.

"We don't have a lot of space right now," I tell her, when she first called. "My roommate's daughter is visiting, so she's in the spare room. We have a rather small couch you can sleep on."

I dread. I can hear her wave a dismissive hand, even over the phone.

"Yes, that'll be fine. Fine."

But somehow, somehow, here she is. In my bedroom.

"Just something on the internet," I tell her. I don't want to tell her what. It's none of her business.

"But what," she says, leaning in, squinting at my screen, "specifically--"

She presses her thumbs to my orange peel heart and tries her hardest to split me open.

"Nothing!" I snap. "It's private."

Offended, my mother snorts, leans back.

"What ever, it doesn't matter. I don't care."

It does matter, to me. It does. To hold little secret jewels in my heart, these little silver pips in my shabby orange flesh. Little untainted memories, unshared, to turn over and over in moments of solitude.

She's asleep in minutes, stretched out on the folded quilts on my floor. She doesn't snore, but she does let out long, low farts. All that gas, kept in all day, blowing her up.

.

Rosie.

Before&After