I stopped eating the meals that Mother brought me when I decided that I no longer wanted to exist. She continued her efforts to get me to eat, of course, carrying in dishes of my favorite foods ranging everywhere from whole roasted chickens covered in butters and herbs, to freshly baked cinnamon rolls slathered in warm, milky white frosting melting down the sides. I refused every meal: breakfast, lunch, dinner, and dessert.
Staring at the same four brick walls for nearly two decades had taken its toll on me. The walls looked as if they had been copied and pasted from the picture books Mother read to me as a child, the same russet shade as the hair that ribboned down my back in one long, thick braid. I trailed the tail of my braid against the turmeric clay, the color of my mane so similar to the walls it nearly disappeared. If I sat against the wall for long enough, pressed my body against it, would I melt into it, vanish without a trace? I tried it each night to no avail despite shrinking with each passing day.
Mother insisted I start eating again, her only argument being that I needed the nourishment to grow into a strong woman, a strong woman with long, beautiful hair. I retorted that I already had long and beautiful hair, to which she told me it was not long and beautiful enough. I wondered if it ever would be long and beautiful enough, or if she planned on feeding me until I popped like a balloon so she could collect my hair and wear it as a wig.
I tracked my progress to death by counting the hair strands as they fell from my head like a shedding animal, collecting them in the corner of my room until a bird’s rest had formed. I tore it apart and reassembled it, stitching the strands together into bracelets and necklaces to adorn my thin wrists and neck. When I looked in the mirror, all that was left of me were my once bright eyes turned dull, and cheekbones I wished could slice Mother’s throat. It was the most beautiful I had ever looked, the most beautiful I had ever felt.
I was eggshell bald when Mother tried to force a slice of white bread down my throat. I protested and screamed – I fought her to the best of my abilities, her long, red, acrylic fingernails tearing my freshly crafted jewelry from my body. My lips sealed together tightly, she held me down and dug her knuckles against the soft white of the bread, pressing it into my mouth. Her knuckles nearly separated my lips when the rough, overbaked crust ripped my paper-thin cheeks, the crust and my cheekbones behaving like two daggers sparring against each other. I winced in pain for a moment before I felt nothing, not the torn skin or the soft bread or the weight of Mother’s body on top of mine.
That is when death took me, breadcrumbs sprinkled around my head like Mother Mary’s crown of stars. Mother straddled my husk, staring down, replacing the slices of bread she still held with what remained of my hair. She unravelled my jewelry and searched the skin on my skull for any fibers she’d missed. She thumbed at the strands, tears streaming down her cheeks, but I was happy to permanently see any other color surround me besides that haunting gold: the sweet relief death brought me was more intense than the satisfaction sleep had handed me each night, letting my eyes softly shut and the world around me becoming black.
I sat with my Mother as she mourned, my newly phantom form undetected by the seemingly devastated woman. I watched as she continued to collect my hair, piece by piece, strand by strand, gathering it into her hands like a woven basket. Leaving my lifeless body behind, she walked to my bedroom across the room and sat on my bed. She began humming softly, the tune switching between a hum and a song as she tied the locks together at the top. She seemed to age twenty years as she sang. Before I knew it, my Mother was completely unrecognizable and I thought she might join me in the afterlife soon.
She gently brushed each section, detangling the neglected tresses and beginning to braid them like she did when I was a child, before I knew how to braid my hair myself. That was when I felt like she loved me, when her fingers combed through my hair and gently caressed my head. She’d occasionally trace my eyebrows, run the tips of her fingers along my face. I ached to feel that again, sitting on the floor and positioning my spectral figure in front of her. I lined my head up with the severed braid so that I could pretend we were Mother and Daughter again, if only for one more moment in time.
When the braid was finished, she stood up and walked towards the window, popping it open. She tied the braid to the windowsill and let it hang out like a flag, something to symbolize my lost life – or hers, or ours. We stood together and watched my braid blow in the wind, but as it blew, it tapped against the glass as if knocking, asking to be let back inside. I wanted to untie it, let it be free, blow away and never return, but she was the only one who could do that. Instead, I stayed by her side as the breeze passed right through me, her body shivering as it aged, wrinkled, delicate, and haggard.
Melissa Martini (she/her) a short fiction writer and Capricorn from New Jersey. She studied Creative Writing in both undergrad and graduate school at Seton Hall University. Currently, she serves as Founder & EIC of Moss Puppy Magazine and is staff at the winnow mag. She can be found @melissquirtle and her publications can be viewed at melibeans.wixsite.com/home. She has three dogs, all of which are fluffballs.