Postcard Memoirs

Kayla Myers

1.

Thick. Cotton. Clutching my body, my neck and throat, like a python.  The turtlenecks only come out in winter at my century-old Victorian house, and I fight, oh, do I fight; I whine, beg; sometimes even cry.  But there is no relief from their weight, their grabbing of my neck as I attempt to sleep. Every night, I lose the fight and my mother forces the heavy snake over my head and around my throat.

2.

My cat was six when she died; the only one who could sense when I was feeling anything but normal. She was always by my side, rubbing her black and white fluff of fur against my arm, purring loudly as a hushed motor in an attempt to comfort me. She purred me through break-ups with boys, fights with my parents, and when I was sick.

 Now, as I sit in the white room of the vet’s office, I want to comfort her, but I cannot. She may sense my fear for what I have to do to her, but she purrs as she lays in my arms, tears streaming down my cheeks, silently, as always.

I think of the old turtleneck I was forced to wear each winter and now I feel like a python as I clutch her to my chest, one arm around her white belly, the other just under her throat.

3.

In the dark, cold bedroom of my Victorian house, I lie still under the white covers that cannot protect me. My fingernails make purple indentations in my palms as my fists clench tight. The turtleneck wraps and curls around me, from belly to throat, under my footy pajamas.

It is bedtime.

Kayla is a Senior majoring in English at the College of Notre Dame of Maryland.  She aspires to teach literature and creative writing to high school students and to travel across the world.  Kayla hopes to use her love for literature, writing and education to one day open a school in El Salvador.  Kayla resides in Baltimore, Maryland and this is her first publication.