girl (girl.).

(a girl is sitting cross-legged on the floor, biting her nails with slow, subdued anxiousness)

(she uncrosses her legs, rocks back to rest her weight in her hands and crosses her ankles, eyes downcast)

(the girl brings her knees into her chest, hugging her arms around them with just a little too much strength, resting her cheek on her knees before realizing this position only offers temporary comfort)

(she relinquishes her grip around her legs, pausing for a moment mid-transition) *

(she succumbs to the banal urge to curl up on the floor, first simply on her side as if sleeping in her bed, then resorting to fetal position, presenting herself as a figure of ultimate vulnerability while using her own body to protect the vital parts)

(she is no longer here. She is gone, the curled, surrendering body floating in some other reality as she sits cross-legged on the floor, biting her nails with slow, subdued anxiousness. She views herself as if suspended in a pool of water – a freshly formaldehyde-ed Damien Hirst exhibit, a piece of art for others to view with confusion or understanding, criticizing objectively but inherently subjective in their judgments, accepting or rejecting her without her even having a chance to defend or explain herself – she-the-work-of-art no longer belongs to herself as soon as she is presented to the world, given away without her consent, open for interpretation.)

(as she sits cross-legged on the floor, biting her nails with slow, subdued anxiousness, she lifts her eyes and greets the world with two challenging orbs of pure, formaldehyde-dripping soul. The exhibit has been taken down. She uncrosses her legs and drops her hand.)

(she stands, a little unsteady, but here she is.)