The wrong garbage
Some things should not be thrown away
Thursday evenings the place was empty, and that was normal. She had a first-year philosophy class, and no matter how she tried to stay detached she kept making friends. This particular night, she stays out a little later, hanging around with her classmates.
When she comes home, she brings in a buzzing energy that fills the space like a song. A tiny orange and white cat greets her, but she is preoccupied with the messenger bag slung over her shoulder. As soon as she’s locked the door behind her, she reaches inside. What she retrieves is not books or homework, but something soft and red. A t-shirt. She holds it at arm’s length in front of her, and looks contentedly at a colorful image printed on the front. She pulls the collar up to her face and takes a sniff, looks at it once more, then lays it out on the bed.
Optimism seeps from one thought to another. Although she could sit and absorb the feeling of finding her place, she always called him at night, and this time she feels good about it.
She dials the number, and instantly folds into herself. The optimism feels less confident. Her voice changes along with her demeanor. It starts out round and full, then turns thin and quiet, and barely hovers over the room.
Several minutes in, she shares the red shirt and sits up a little taller. “A gift from a new friend … Too small for him … My favorite band,” she says.
When the conversation pauses, she folds deeper. “He’s just someone from class,” she says, but her defense is meek.
The place fills up with smoke, and the tarnished silver tray fills with cigarette butts. The cat sits beneath the window and squints. The red shirt spends the night crumpled up on the floor.
Friday mornings there’s another class, and she leaves behind the apartment, the cat, and the shirt. She doesn’t linger after this class, but comes straight back.
This space is a gift from her parents, a provision from afar. The apartment is furnished with the bare minimum, but it’s enough for a nice weekend at home. In the tiny kitchen, there is a tiny stove that longs to provide warm meals, and a small table that would like to serve them to a girl in a red t-shirt. Most of her classmates have to make do with a hot plate. She has more space to herself here than what four girls share in one dorm.
She doesn’t know what to do with space, isn’t aware that she can fill it. He keeps her folded so that the apartment feels too empty.
This Friday, like every Friday, she packs her bag and her cat and walks out the door with the red t-shirt in hand. On the way to the car, she tosses the t-shirt in the dumpster. In seven long years, it will be him she crumples up and tosses into the dumpster, but for now she drives back to him with her meowing cat in the passenger seat.
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Wow. You are such a powerful writer. This one made me tearful.