𝔚𝔥𝔢𝔫 𝔱𝔥𝔢𝔶 𝔟𝔢𝔞𝔱 𝔱𝔥𝔢 𝔰𝔥𝔦𝔱 𝔬𝔲𝔱 𝔬𝔣 𝔶𝔬𝔲, 𝔶𝔬𝔲 𝔩𝔬𝔳𝔢𝔡 𝔦𝔱

Belinda Cai

In another world, you are wearing Brock Turner’s skin. When the door opened and the first blow was dealt, it broke your nose and cracked your wireframe glasses.

You skid backwards onto the grass, fresh green stains on your jean pockets. You see him approaching and you don’t even try to run.

Instead, you have an identity crisis.

Who are you? One day, you’ll wake up as a credit analyst for a bank in the hometown you never left, balding and with no idea how to dress yourself. You’ll remember your glory days, but not remember exactly how long ago they were.

Your sheltered, milquetoast, privileged suburban life bored you. This, no. This thrilled you.

He comes back and slams the side of your face into the dirt. Something warm is dripping down your cheeks, into the earth. He reaches for your pockets. You surrender.

You used to make jokes about “people like him,” but yet, in this most unpredictable moment, you feel something that might be empathy or even love.

Maybe he needs what you have more than you do. Maybe you don’t want what you have. Maybe you resent it. Maybe you despise it all. You laugh slowly, then you pick up the pace, like a crescendoing opera singer before the curtains fall.

It hurt so good. You’d never felt more alive.

Belinda Cai is an L.A.-based writer, poet, musician, and raging Aries. Her writing has been published in VICE, Hobart Pulp, Car Crash Collective, Midcult, High Femme, Bitch Media, Entropy Magazine, Tinder, and more.

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/__blender/

Substack: https://existinginbetween.substack.com/