DREAMING IN GREEN, LIVING IN DUST

by Bear Rodrigues-Kindfield

Everything about being a child was green and smelled like earth.
Everything about being a child was.
Everything about being a child is confusing.
So many things happened while I was sleeping.

Sleeping is a kind way to say what she was, sedated is more like it. He felt threatened by her thunderous cries, her tsunami emotions. He kept her quiet.

I don’t know how I woke up or
I do know how
I don’t know why or
Do I?

Mr. Psych Professor, his feet swung below the table, we watched when we got bored in class. He slept while trying to teach us. He tried to teach us. He taught us things he hadn’t intended to. Taught her back into existence, taught her awake. His voice, his reading assignments, his short swinging legs, they reversed the anesthesia that had been pumped through her veins.

Everything about being a child happened in summer. Everything about being a child happened. Everything about being a child is happening.
The body changed so much while I was sleeping.

The body, how it holds us, how we’ve held it, how we’ve left it, how we’ve altered its skin. She touched the skin with razors, bathed the body in blood, a ritual. They held needles, bathed the body in ink, a sublimation. He put us in a surgical gown, bathed the body in florescent light, a claiming. We’ve all done things to make the body our own.

The College Roommate, the So Much More Than a College Roommate, they asked us questions no one had thought to ask before. Sometimes they asked with words; other times only their eyes spoke. He didn’t know how to answer. He didn’t have answers. He only had a story, a detailed narrative. But their questions reached past what he had written. Their questions touched her sleeping, sedated body.

Everything about being a child sounded like the ocean. Everything about being a child felt like floating in water. Everything about being a child was.
Everything about being a child happened.

Everything about being a little girl we are learning.

She dreamt of swimming effortlessly in the body of the ocean. She dreamt of warmth and green earth. Of sunshine and honeysuckle. She dreamt of frolicking in fields. She dreamt with a heart full of joy.
She woke with a jolt, a flash, a moment moving through her.

Everything about being a child turned dark and tasted like copper. Everything about being a child became red hot and itchy. Everything about being a little girl got turned on its head.

In their shared body, shared brain, he could feel her waking up, feel the sedative wearing off. He tried to pump more in. She would not sleep. She slumped in her former resting spot, eyes wide open. He felt like a failure. Failure weighed him down. He lay on the ground and stayed there. Shackled himself to the body so as not to get left behind, and like that, the body drug him around for months.

She slumped under the rib cage; he shackled to the ankles, the body lived. The body breathed. The body moved forward. The body loved us even when we didn’t know how to love it back.

They went to war. Maybe with the body. Maybe with each other. Maybe with themselves. Young boy. Little girl. Two selves, their shared body, turned battlefield.

Everything about growing up was grey and smelled like dust. Everything about growing up was.
Everything about growing up is confusing.
So many things happened before I was born.

She was a child with no monsters under her bed. She had a smile that gave the sun competition. A laugh that was larger than her little girl body. She was whole.

Brother was a world she wanted to move to. He was so silly, so funny, so fun. She could watch him for hours. He taught her what it meant to be a child. She loved learning from him.

The monster crushed the brother world, ripped laughter from the little girl’s lungs, took away her voice while he was at it.

I was born to put voice back in the body. I was born to fill the gap left by losing the brother world. I was born to protect her. Or to protect the body. Probably both. I protected my self instead. I did the best I could with what I had. My best is changing now.

Everything about being a little girl is remembering.

Everything about being a young boy is listening. Everything about sharing a body is forgiveness.

She dreamt of swimming effortlessly in the body of the ocean. She dreamt of warmth and green earth. Of sunshine and honeysuckle. She dreamt of frolicking in fields. She dreamt with a heart full of joy.
She woke with a jolt, a flash, a moment moving through her.

Everything about being a child turned dark and tasted like copper. Everything about being a child became red hot and itchy. Everything about being a little girl got turned on its head.

In their shared body, shared brain, he could feel her waking up, feel the sedative wearing off. He tried to pump more in. She would not sleep. She slumped in her former resting spot, eyes wide open. He felt like a failure. Failure weighed him down. He lay on the ground and stayed there. Shackled himself to the body so as not to get left behind, and like that, the body drug him around for months.

She slumped under the rib cage; he shackled to the ankles, the body lived. The body breathed. The body moved forward. The body loved us even when we didn’t know how to love it back.

They went to war. Maybe with the body. Maybe with each other. Maybe with themselves. Young boy. Little girl. Two selves, their shared body, turned battlefield.

Everything about growing up was grey and smelled like dust. Everything about growing up was.
Everything about growing up is confusing.
So many things happened before I was born.

She was a child with no monsters under her bed. She had a smile that gave the sun competition. A laugh that was larger than her little girl body. She was whole.

Brother was a world she wanted to move to. He was so silly, so funny, so fun. She could watch him for hours. He taught her what it meant to be a child. She loved learning from him.

The monster crushed the brother world, ripped laughter from the little girl’s lungs, took away her voice while he was at it.

I was born to put voice back in the body. I was born to fill the gap left by losing the brother world. I was born to protect her. Or to protect the body. Probably both. I protected my self instead. I did the best I could with what I had. My best is changing now.

Everything about being a little girl is remembering.

Everything about being a young boy is listening. Everything about sharing a body is forgiveness