for
Ani DiFranco
She closed the book, placed it on the table, and finally decided to––
“Walk through the door.” The voice was ambient, but singular, too.
She had just at that moment been rising from the sunbit rug and turning towards the door, she had made a decision, but this voice, it wasn't right. She couldn't do it now. “I'm not going to walk through that door,” she said under her breath, unaware that she looked like a crazy person to anyone happening to stroll by the wide bay window and glance through their own reflection at the small woman on display. “That's what they want, isn't it. Nothing would make them happier than for me to grab that shiny, dull little knob and twist it and step out into the street. But this is my life.” She bit her lower lip, medium-hard, the subtle pain calming her ever so slightly, like a single drag from a cigarette. There was a clock on the wall, ticking meekly. She stared at its eye, and felt herself aging in its hands.
“But wait,” she muttered, pulling at the vines of her hair, “This is my life. I can't just listen to voices, or not listen to them. I–” she stopped, confused. Not from a lack of intelligence, mind you, but from the turbulence of her brain. She was haggard. The muscles on her face were as tight as a pair of jeans that fit if you're standing, but won't allow you to sit.
The telephone rang and she jumped.
“God! that better not be my mother again.” She let it ring and
ring, flinching a little less at each iteration. The machine finally
picked up, squealing and popping mercilessly, and yes, it was all
written in the book, it was her mother on the phone. “Hey, kiddo,
listen, why haven't you walked through the door? Just walk through
the door, and I'll take care of everything. I'll find you a lawyer,
I'll make sure you're ok, maybe you want to travel a little and get
out there and meet new people. Just walk through that door. Hon?
Kiddo? Are you there? Listen to me, I've been
there, I went through everything you're going through when I was your
age and you shouldn't be reinventing the wheel, you don't want your
life to be a cliché. . . I won't let anything bad happen to you,
honey, just walk through the door! I mean it!” The machine
screeched off.
The sun slashed through the scattered blinds that hung, plastic, behind the aging glass. She felt a desperate need to be on the other side of the door. Freedom, she said to herself, freedom, freedom, freedom, she kept repeating it, the more it hammered softly on her lips the more convinced she was.
“But I can't do what my mother wants me to do I can't, I can't, I gotta. . .” She hadn't really been reading the book, actually, she couldn't even remember what it was called or who it was by or what it was about. But it had felt so good in her hands. She sank, indian-style, to the rug, and picked it up again and sighed.
It was bound in something approaching leather, and it was both soft and hard.
The title?
THERE IS NO DOOR.
All the crushed electricity went out of her, and she suddenly got it.
The author?
She recognized her own name, and smiled.
March 2012
Tucson, Arizona
The sun slashed through the scattered blinds that hung, plastic, behind the aging glass. She felt a desperate need to be on the other side of the door. Freedom, she said to herself, freedom, freedom, freedom, she kept repeating it, the more it hammered softly on her lips the more convinced she was.
“But I can't do what my mother wants me to do I can't, I can't, I gotta. . .” She hadn't really been reading the book, actually, she couldn't even remember what it was called or who it was by or what it was about. But it had felt so good in her hands. She sank, indian-style, to the rug, and picked it up again and sighed.
It was bound in something approaching leather, and it was both soft and hard.
The title?
THERE IS NO DOOR.
All the crushed electricity went out of her, and she suddenly got it.
The author?
She recognized her own name, and smiled.
March 2012
Tucson, Arizona
