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7 11 (Seven Eleven) After Hours
Folder:
The Pixie Dust
The unobtrusive stones crunch under the weight of her car’s tires.
She pulls into the empty lot, closest spot, what luck!
Slowly, the gear shift is manipulated to “P” for patience.
Deep breaths… Have to remember to calm down.
Heart racing, nervous foot tapping, and a cold sweat
The nervous jitters find a home in her muscles,
They expand and contract viciously as she begs her heart to slow.
Breaking even,
She manages to get the door open without falling right out,
But shortly after standing, kisses the gravel on the way down,
Like a one night stand that should have ended before it began.
Crumpled up like a dream school rejection letter,
She let’s her tears blend with the drizzle of rain
And a dribble of urine runs down her leg.
The threatening glow of the green and orange 7 11 sign stands guard
Daring her to try to drag herself inside.
Not one car passes in the time it takes her to make it to her feet and to the spider web glass door.
Lines jab and flow up the glass, begging to be leaned against so they may be free
Begging to fall like snow, to be seen as beautiful instead on an eyesore.
She shuffles into the store, wet, and disheveled.
Aisle one: gift cards and magazines begging for her to purchase them like some whore from 8 mile begging for the money to put “Jessica” through private school.
She barely gives them a glance before she’s on to the next aisle.
Medicine, condoms, hair spray, a pregnancy test; sounds like an enchanting evening.
This aisle begs for attention and mocks her saying,
You should have thought of me before you ended up here.
This aisle was like the ghost of Christmas past, memories only from a couple hours ago, and regrets.
The items mock her, and she swats at them, knocking them to the ground.
That will show them.
Food did not sound appealing, so the rest of the aisles made her stomach turn
Like the Baltic Sea, and she approached the counter, no cashier in sight.
“Hello? Hello? Can anyone hear me?”
The door opens, and a man in blue is on top of her.
Like the man who was on top of her, and in her top, and popping her top.
Blood still caked her thighs.
The man rolls her onto her stomach and puts cuffs around her wrists,
Feeling so familiar, she had just escaped it,
Brought back abruptly like a naughty child yanked to the corner by his ear
From his harlot of a mother.
The illumination of the 7 11 sign waves goodbye as she is thrown in the back of the man’s car,
And she never sees the cashier once.
