Milk

By TheJudddman

Doctor Howard wasn’t too fond of my words. He didn’t seem to understand just what my form needed. It didn’t make sense. Wouldn’t he want this for me? Wouldn’t he want my bones to be the best they could be?

Please don’t do this, he said.

I must. It is my new life’s purpose.

It doesn’t even exist! There is no point!

I said nothing and left.

I never could play with the other kids. The Memory hurt too much for me to want to remember. But I did anyway. Front yard of neighbor’s house. Jimmy Lupo threw the football. My young self chased after it. I wanted that ball like a hungry man to a fresh ham. I catched it, rushed toward the touchdown zone, marked by the neighbor’s car. 

It was there. I damn near had it.

Michael Melito was there too, behind me. He tackled me.

Poor Mike. He never knew, just as I never knew. Just as my parents never knew.

I never should have been out there in the first place.

How would I even describe it? Ribs, shoulder, arm, hip, all cracked asunder. It was like a living breathing boulder who didn’t know that there was a human under it.

But he learned. Michael knew when my parents ran outside, alerted by my screams that shredded my throat. He and all the other children knew when my red, Bruise-marbled body was bound to the stretcher as my mother and father watched with heavy sobs as their tears crashed and exploded on the ground. One of the other kids, Sandra Lee, rushed past the paramedics and left a dandelion by my thin, broken hand. Michael was back on the lawn. On his knees, sobbing into his hands, surrounded by the other children saying

I didn’t know! I didn’t know! I’m so sorry! I’m sorry!

Somehow the biggest kid in the friend group looked so small that day.

I don’t blame him. I don’t blame anyone.

Why was I born this way? Why was I made to be so fragile? Why must my parents be burdened by this accident? By this condition? By me?

I barely leave the house much anymore. My parents talk to me occasionally, although their messages have become a lot more infrequent. The corners and sides of my kitchen table and counter are protected with blue pool noodles cut to shape and slipped onto the sides. All of this is here because even a light bump into the table will leave me a broken hip and a trip to the hospital. 

I hate those pool noodles. They always seem to remind me that the day my whole body was broken was the day I lost any sense of autonomy. I never wanted those pool noodles there, but my mother insisted otherwise. She didn’t want her little boy getting hurt. I love them to death, but they never let me breathe, just as they never let themselves breathe after that incident.

I opened up my medicine cabinet. In the bottom row of the shelf is where the temporary fix lies. I weave my hand past the medicine bottles like an explorer through a jungle of bisphosphonates with the golden idol at the end labeled “Calcium and Vitamin D”. I take a sip of coffee and a pill and leave them to dance together in my stomach. 

Breakfast felt strange today. I never thought that I would have a last meal for something. It doesn’t feel like a last meal on death row but it feels like something is most definitely dying.

My bags are packed with the essentials. Rope, rations, water, etc. Everything needed to survive the challenges that shall greet me soon. 

I don’t have many people to say goodbye to. If I told my parents, they would do almost anything in their power to stop me. I wish I could tell them about the journey I would take. I wish I could tell them that imbibing upon the milk of that sacred cow would make all of their problems fade away, that all of MY problems would fade away.

I kiss goodbye to an empty house in a cold neighborhood, wished farewell by a frozen gale and a slammed door.

My flight leaves in 2 hours.

God help me with this.