I love how an extra hair tie is always choking their wrists
I love how the ladies room door swinging shut feels like an exhale
I love that the best way they’ve come up with to avoid lipstick on their front teeth is to suck on their index finger
I love how they dab at the corners of their nostrils after snorting a line
I love how they snore louder than men
I love how they’re quiet as a church mouse when everyone in the house is asleep
I love how they surprise themselves with their joy, pushing it down a little bit with the palm of their hand over their mouth
I love how the moon follows them everywhere
I love how they swarm like bees when something bad happens
I love how they have their own languages and 90% of them have to do with what it means when they touch their hair
I love how they chew on straws like a rat; I love how they hoard napkins
I love how they can always have a fresh pot of coffee going
I love how salty they are; how mosquitoes lay down their lives for a taste
I love how squirting is a secret, and also a language
I love how they wish they could squirt hot sauce or Merlot
I love the intricate Russian nesting doll system of their purses (a pouch for lipstick inside a bag for makeup inside a tote)
I love how anger thrums florescent inside of them
I love how anger is a helicopter stationed directly over them
I love how anger wakes them from a deep sleep
I love how they say “I love you” like a command
I love how they say “I love you” like a treaty
I love how they say “I love you” like a wave just before it breaks
I love how you can shut them up with silence
I love how all their silences grow teeth and bite
I love how they can fit an eye-roll into a blink
I love how they can fit ten different outfits into a backpack
I love how much they love splitting a side of fries
I love how their legs are softer with two-day-old stubble than they are freshly shaved
I love how they drag a razor all over their body and don’t even think about it
I love how they shove cotton all the way inside their body and don’t even think about it
I love how they can always crowd source a band-aid
I love how easily they ask for help
I love how you can scare them just by driving fast on the freeway
I love how you can scare them just by not texting back for a day
I love how you can scare them just by closing the front door
I love how they always remind people to eat
I love how they wash cucumbers
I love how they love to touch their own bones
I love how they all have blankets in the trunks of their cars
I love how they gasp even when they see it coming
I love how they gasp when you stick two fingers inside of them
I love how they use their whole body when scrubbing dishes
I love how they can strain a scream into a sigh
I love their terrible memories, riddled with holes like an unfurled accordion streamer
I love when they tell men they sometimes disassociate during sex and men say that sounds cool
I love how they leave their bodies without ever visiting an online forum on astral projecting
I love that specific face they make in front of the mirror
I love how standing in front of mirrors makes them sick
I love how standing in front of mirrors makes them swell
I love how they know how to cry without making a sound
I love how they will drive five hours
I love how they always want to know what they can bring
I love how they love to eat dinner in bed
I love how they stare at one spot on the carpet in waiting rooms, and twist their ring around and around their middle finger
I love how the same thing happened to their sister’s friend’s cousin
I love how they say hello to every tiny dog
I love how easily they’ll get on their knees
I love how their backs always hurt from the weight of some invisible force
I love how they can fit through almost every window
I love how they’re scared but they’ll do it anyways
I love the dark patches of hair fertilizing their armpits
I love how their bodies are always trying to kill them
I love how they stay up late reading about serial killers
I love how they’re always ten minutes late in a cloud of perfume
I love how they’re always the last to discover their own bodies
I love how they have convinced themselves they love to sit on the ground
I love how they didn’t know they had bodies until they turned eleven, or twelve, or even ten
I love how they cry on their birthdays
I love how they’re each assigned one long dark nipple hair
I love how their gut speaks in sonar and never stutters
I love how, in high school, their AP Government teacher puts a post-it note on their desks that reads, your public opinion is showing – pull up your neckline
I love the texts they receive at 2:37AM
I love how their ear gets crushed against a man’s breastbone
I love how they sit like origami on public transportation
I love that they feel things all the time like warm dry wind or undertow
I love how they close down the dance floor
I love how they are making a concerted effort to apologize less
I love how they are always slightly dehydrated
I love how their fingernails clench half-moons into their palms while they are sleeping
I love how they love their therapists more than their mothers
I love how they are always folding sadness into dough
I love how ghosts love their light footsteps
I love how men follow them home and the moon does nothing
I love how they lock their front door and it does nothing
I love how they say sorry and it does nothing
I love how they’ll lay across everyone’s lap if the car is full
I love how they are always looking at the treetops and stars
I love how they always have an astrological explanation
I love how they scrape black pencil along the inside of their eyeballs
I love how they sneak kale into everything
I love how they’re all waiting for an overdue email
I love how they ask for the long version when someone is telling a story
I love how they drink their placenta in a smoothie
I love how sorry they are for saying sorry all the time
I love how they teach themselves to swallow everything sharp
I love how they swallow so much they should have spat out
I love how it all lives inside of them now.