On Repeat

It’s Katy Pery’s Roar blaring through my headphones, on repeat, over and over again. Walking through Grand Central one day later, feeling like I just walked into my best friends’ arms. My home. My city. This part has not been taken from me. Will not be taken from me. A power that comes from walking across the same floor for the past twenty five years and all that’s happened and I’m still here. I’m still here. I live here. This city is mine. A beaming smile and rush of endorphins, I could run a marathon, I just ran a marathon.

It’s fleeting, but it’s enough to know that I will survive this. With power and strength.

It’s the text she sent me on the way to the bachelorette party, “Tonight you are… Anna! The happy go lucky “25” year old! Anna is still in grad school and recently got back from Spain.” I have to go to the party, life goes on I decided immediately, but it’s nothing short of becoming another person that will get me through the night. The ones who don’t know, who I can’t say a word to, about the beginning or the middle or the end, gush about how wonderful he is, sipping cranberry vodka through penis straws. I escape to the bathroom, “Leave. Now.” she replies. I hesitate, “Anna doesn’t know who he is…” But even Anna can’t keep the fake smile plastered on my face and I leave.

It’s the sob on the Queensborough Plaza subway platform.

It’s the hooded sweatshirt I’ve had since 14, pulled on over my dress, as I slide onto the train seat, curl up against the window, teeth chattering in the air conditioning. I reach for my phone and write him the email. All the words that I couldn’t get out on Friday morning. Angry, hurt words.

It’s Ciara’s Like a Boy.