Marianne and I go to the abortion clinic. Marianne is pregnant with twins. Protestors tell us that our babies are already breathing, living adults with full time jobs, a mortgage, and kids of their own. One of our babies is a doctor. The other an unemployed lawyer with a foot fetish. Do you really want to snuff out a life?
The outside of the clinic is painted pink. This is representative of something. Inside, the walls are painted sea foam green. Marianne says she hopes that sea foam green is the gender of her baby because she finds it very soothing.
The nurse, a man, takes us back to the exam room and tells Marianne to take off her clothing. She slowly removes her shirt and then her skirt and then her bra and finally lets her underwear drop to the floor.
“I never want to call them panties,” she says.
The nurse feels Marianne’s breasts and then between her legs.
“Is this part of the examination?” she asks.
The doctor comes in and kills all of Marianne’s babies. He strangles the lawyer with a noose.
“I probably deserved it,” the lawyer says before he dies.
The doctor is gentler with the doctor because they are one and the same. He takes an entire bottle of sleeping pills and washes them down with his favorite whiskey.
I read four magazines in the lobby during the procedure. I hear nothing. I learn what cut of jeans to wear for my body type. I read an article about a woman who ate her identical twin in the womb.
Marianne and I go to the bar and take shots of tequila. I throw up a little in my mouth and it starts to come out of my nose. We go into the bathroom together and I seduce her in the toilet stall. My fingers are a tight squeeze but eventually I work my fist up inside of her and then my entire arm, shoulder and torso. I pull her skin up like a wet suit. She feels warm and rubbery. I can move, though she is tight around my neck.
Marianne tells a man who might be twenty years older than her or who might be only two years older than her about the time she got depressed and spent three weeks in the hospital talking about her feelings. Marianne takes shots to drown out her sorrows. Marianne isn’t scared to talk in clichés. What does she care if you don’t understand her abstractions? Marianne isn’t going to show you anything. Marianne is going to shoot back four shots of tequila. Marianne is going to bring that boy home from the bar and talk about the size of his dick on the internet. I can feel him inside me inside of her. I slide around when she moves. I need some double sided tape or some glue. I used to glue my fingers together in elementary school. When I pulled them apart, they left an imprint like shed skin of a snake. I was always worried I was going to wait too long and I would be stuck like that forever.