A glimpse

The door burst open, and the shouting voices of a man, a woman, and a girl shattered the silence of the dimly lit room. A girl stepped inside and slammed the door shut. She slid down to the floor, her knees bloodied and scratched, blue and green bruises blooming across her legs like watercolor stains. She picked at the torn skin, sand and dirt trapped between the wounds. Her fingers trembled—nails bitten down to the flesh, cuticles red and inflamed. The chipped blue polish on her fingertips flaked away with every movement. She tried to dig out the grit, but her fingers were too raw, too useless.

She lifted her head to the room, smelling like old smoke and gasoline, the kind of stench that clung to walls and never left. Water-stained wallpaper peeled at the edges. The table was littered with crushed beer cans and dusted with thin white lines of coke. In the corner, an old mattress lay on the floor—the place they collapsed when they couldn’t stand. Beside it, a bucket and empty eucalyptus air freshener sprays, their scent failing to mask the staleness of sweat, blood, and something sourer. A tattered curtain hung over the desk, the yellow glow of the lamp giving the room an eerie, cinematic quality. Like a film set. The kind where they use diffusion filters to make the light softer, almost surreal.

It’s all about the lighting, she thought.

In daylight, this place was just another crack den. The stains on the mattress—blood, piss, whatever else—would be as visible as the bruises on her skin. The needles scattered across the floor would catch the sunlight at just the right angle, shimmering between ten in the morning and two in the afternoon. like stars, they shined on this dark carpet. It depended on the season, of course. And the weather.

But here, it never rained. She rested her head against the door and shut her eyes, pretending.

"This moment is not real. I am being watched. At this moment, some observer is looking at me, wondering why I have these bruises, why I’m not crying, why I’m alone. Or maybe they already know and think this movie is too gloomy. Perhaps they’ve left already—maybe the movie isn’t as interesting as they thought. Maybe it’s the acting. My acting. I should probably cry now and rest my head on the floor instead, in that baby-cradling position. But no, it can’t be my acting. It must be my momma. She should have shouted at me louder. Or maybe ignored me entirely. Pops should have just left. A kid whose dad left them is a much sadder story. Fuck."

She exhaled sharply and leaned forward, crawling toward the table. She picked up a few cans, shaking them for anything left inside. One rattled differently. She tipped it, watching as a crumpled piece of plastic slipped to the bottom. Her fingers stretched inside, her raw skin pressing against the object as she pulled it out. She sucked the pain away from her fingertips before unwrapping the plastic. A small packet of white powder nestled inside. She ran a damp finger through the powder and brought it to her tongue.

"This doesn’t taste like the cocaine Mom does," she whispered, as if she had uncovered a secret meant only for her and the watchers.

She took the white powder and rubbed it on her gums the way her mom did before cooking dinner. The thought of cooking—or eating anything at all—felt even stranger to her. Her gums went numb, and she began to laugh as she touched them. no longer feeling the pain in her fingernails, she dipped her fingers into the powder and pressed it against her knees. She didn’t mind the bruises, though. She called them her war trophies.

She stood, grabbing the curtain draped over the desk. Wrapping it around her chest and waist, she tucked the corners the way she had seen fashion YouTubers do. Spinning, she imagined herself on the red carpet, striking a pose like Audrey Hepburn in front of the Sacré-Cœur. then, she leaned down, grabbed a needle from the floor, and lay across the table, cigarette-style, imitating Hepburn in Breakfast at Tiffany’s.

"Fred, darling," she murmured, voice soft, dreamy, "did I tell you how divinely and utterly happy I am?"

She tossed the needle into the corner and collapsed onto the mattress. then silence settled over her like dust. the kind of silence that screams with hollowness. The kind of stillness that swallowed everything whole. The way a Parkinson’s patient stares at the wall, lost in something no one else can see. The way a war hero kneels before a church cross every Sunday. The way a mother looks at the empty crib where her baby once slept.

She lifted a hand toward the lamp, whispering, "It’s better to look at the sky than live there… such an empty place, so vague… just a country where the thunder goes… and... and—", Her voice trailed off.

Her eyes ached. She didn’t know if it was from the light or the bruises pressing beneath her skin. She clenched them shut, forcing herself not to cry. But then, like the bursting of a broken dam, she wept until she was out of breath. Until exhaustion soothed her to sleep.

The yellow lamp flickered. Once. Twice.

Then, with a soft pop, the bulb went out.