So many years later

I don’t even remember his name, maybe

it was Nick or Brian or Sam.  Gin was involved.  I liked the way he looked at me

looking at him.  I liked opening myself to him,

how I spilled out my life to anyone

who pretended to listen, wanting what the boys always

wanted; a moment and gone.

We did it in the apartment I shared with my sister, where

the door always stuck and I could hear my small nephew’s cries

from the other room.  When I looked out my bedroom window

I could see his face pressed against the glass of the adjacent window

calling my name; my own response reverberating in the inky night.

Early in the still morning dark,  my mind a fog,

I heard my sister gather her things for the a.m. shift at the diner, calling

him names: You little shit! while I waited silent

behind my closed door.