Space Cadet

You are self-sufficient. A middle sibling. A former moonchild. But you organize yourself. Make yourself known. Refuse to be forgotten. And it doesn’t hurt. People have things, other people, on their minds. You plan own your birthday. It is unfair to assume that someone will surprise you. Or remember. No one forgets unless you want them to. 

You take care of others—make grilled cheeses for your little sister and clean up the Coca Cola stain she let soak into your rug for three weeks. 

When

She overhears 

“Lazy,” “careless,” “not like her sisters”

Your father.

You lunge 

To catch the glass of twinkling cola

But it shatters, expanding into time and direction, bounding across carpets and through floors.

You wrap the closest splatter in a cocoon of blankets until she stops crying. You don’t shake her or demand she clean up. You try not to ask her to consider others, to preserve what isn’t hers. You want more than anything to be a cushion.

Sometimes, you are a hammer. 

Your older sister disappears

Into her studies. 

You forget her

“What’s the oldest up to?” “Works so hard.”

Recall, 

call.

She’s never brought a partner home either. Your dual spinsterhood is dismissed as ambition—noses to the ground, leaning in, digging deep.  

Your parents are proud. But eventually, you know they’ll wonder if they messed you up: Dad thinking about his hand over your eyes during kissy scenes; Mom scrutinizing her jokes about boy-crazy high school friends. 

You assumed would it be your turn. One day. The available boys were cute, but not nice. They pop out of your mind like little bubbles. Girls never popped in. 

You waited it out. 

You wait it out. 

For eternal companionship, kisses seem a small price.

But they can’t help wanting moor: to reel you in, tie you down, dig you up, polish you off. Keep you from floating away. It is exactly what you want, but not. 

Sometimes, it is painful to be second on the love playlist—like scrambling to get a partner for a school project. 

By now, the whole class is your friend. 

It’s nice.

No one listens to just one song, anyway. 

Yet,

Hope leers.

    You          that you won’t have to tell your parents. 

    You          that you will prove yourself a late bloomer before they start asking.

You accept, and make unkind wishes against acceptance, and chastise yourself, and accept again.

You take care and remember not to forget

Yourself

Your sisters.