Shark Girl by Kelly Bingham Read Free Book Online Page A

fascinating people.
    Like you. Your mom said on the phone
    that you are an artist?”
    Mom has the decency to blush.
    “I
was,
” I tell Sam.
    “You still can be, you know,” Sam says. “I had a —”
    I shut him up quick. I don’t want to hear any more
    inspirational stories. I’m sick of them.
    “Do people ever have more than one prosthesis?” I ask.
    Sam nods. “Yes, most have one functional
    and one cosmetic.”
    After a discussion over insurance,
    we order both.
    But I’m thinking:
    I can’t wear that thing.
    I won’t.
    It’s an insult.
    “It’s not bad enough people lose arms,”
    I say to Sam and Mom.
    “But on top of it,
    we’re supposed to look like Captain Hook?”
    Sam regards me seriously.
    “You are a very attractive girl, Jane.
    Inside and out. I can tell.
    I think you’ll find
    the more comfortable you are with yourself,
    the more people won’t notice your prosthesis.
    Or absence of one,
    if that’s how you eventually choose to go.
    I think that you’ll find . . .”
    I let him prattle on.
    He’s trying to help.
    But obviously, he’s never been
    in my shoes.
    So aside from the medical part,
    what
    does he know?
     

    Fixing me lunch. Fixing me snacks.
    Hanging around while I talk on the phone.
    Mom hovers like a fly, buzzing.
    “Don’t forget to —”
    “Be sure and —”
    “No. Not that way.”
    Reminding me
    about
everything
I already know.
    “Buckle that strap; no,
that
one . . .”
    two seconds before I plan on doing it.
    “Now clean that socket before you put on your prosthesis,
    and
after you take it off.
    You don’t want it to get an odor.”
    “I know!” escapes my lips.
    Then
    hurt eyes,
    pouting,
    silence.
    “I’m just trying to help” hangs heavy in the air.
    Sometimes her “help”
    is more exhausting than doing it myself.
    Seems easier to just shut up and let her talk,
    then let her do it all for me, anyway.
    I wonder sometimes
    if she knows that.
     

    When I was nine, I took horseback riding lessons.
    My instructor, Debbie, imparted advice around a cigarette.
    “Throw your heart over the fence,” Debbie said.
    “The horse will follow. Confidence.
    Your horse responds to your body language.”
    Maybe this fake arm,
    whom I have named Chuck,
    is like a horse.
    Practicing reaching for a book,
    I visualize, stand tall,
    then throw my heart over to the object,
    hoping Chuck will follow.
    Tilt forward at the waist,
    shrug, open hand, pull back to shut.
    As in riding,
    the ideal doesn’t always happen.
    Sometimes the book slithers to the floor.
    I want to whip something. Someone.
    I have to walk around and breathe deep.
    Chuck and I cool down, apart.
    But as in riding,
    sooner or later,
    we saddle up
    and try again.
     

    Here’s a question.
    If we —
    and by “we” I mean an amputee —
    are supposed to be accepting,
    unashamed of our new body,
    unconcerned by gawks and furtive glances,
    unfazed about blending,
    then why are artificial hands crafted
    to look so real?
    There’s “hair” on the “skin,”
    half-mooned fingernails,
    and wrinkles around the knuckles.
    The labor involved
    in painting a freckle,
    an age spot on a silicone glove,
    the money spent
    on such artists to do such things
    speaks to a desire
    to melt
    back into the blur.
    Why don’t they just come clean
    instead of giving us
    pamphlets about
    self-image?
     

    If only Michael hadn’t been so busy flirting his butt off with those stupid girls. He would have come in with you.
    So?
    Then it wouldn’t have happened. Maybe the two of you together would have looked like too large a mass to be a seal or a fish or whatever, and the shark would have passed you by.
    Or it might have been Michael.
    Better him than you.
    Oh, God, how can I even think such a thing? Stop it!
    Your life would be so different right now.
    He didn’t come in. And it wasn’t him. It was me. That’s the way it is.
    It could have been different.
    I know.
    It
should
have been different.
     

    I run my