a thing i'm working on.

"charlotte. i'm watching it. i'm watching the lion king." 

his voice is urgent, sharp. my throat is dry. i check the clock and replay the message three more times. how long has it been? fourteen weeks since he moved out, two since the last time his sponsor called with an update. i do the math. calling at 4am means he missed curfew at the halfway house means he could be anywhere.

i don't recognize the number. 

"pick up, char. i'm watching the lion king."

i'm fuzzy from lunesta and two tabs of lorazapam. i haven't slept in what feels like years because this always happens, because this phone call always comes. my fingers are clumsy and i hit the wrong number on the phone at my bedside table. i need to dial three. 

finally, a voice on the other end. "adele, i'm sorry, it's charlotte."

she repeats my name as she passes the phone to Tim, the Sponsor, who's instantly wide awake. sober.

"shit, char. where is he?" 

i don't know. my cell is buzzing

L_O_ KI_G.

L

I

O

N

K

I

" 

my apartment is a mess. i've moved eight times in the last six months, existing on sublets and acquaintances' couches until twelve days ago when i moved here, to this miserable hole in the wall where i exist on unrefrigerated orange juice and don't have my own bathroom.  

"charlotte?" 

i'm trying to remember the last time i felt like a person. the last time i wore something other than this awful grey sweatshirt that has become as much a part of me as my skin. i remind myself what day it is, what year.  

"i'm here. i'll call the house and the cops." 

"don't pick it up, char." 

the screen is bright and buzzing. i can feel it in my brain, can actually picture the vibrations running down my arms and legs, charging through my nervous system, lighting me up like a christmas tree.

 "LIONKINGLIONKINGLIONKING"

i'm trying to focus but i can feel myself slipping. i grab the bottle on the table next to me and force myself to read the number on the cell phone to tim who i know is trying to calm adele, who i know is crying. 

"i'm on my way." 

there is an ambulance parked outside, lights flashing. i can hear the fire truck on its way-- the siren gets louder and louder, wailing, hurrying, rushing, and i don't even hear the phone explode as it hits the concrete after falling six floors from my bedroom window. 

“is it just me, am I seeing things?
or does the way we breathe make perfect sense?
i could start fires with what I feel for you
the sun could fade out and we’d see it through”

— david ramirez, "fires"

the next month of my life will be spent figuring out what i’m doing with the months that will come after it. for the first time in a long time i’m healthy enough to have options— i can pursue dreams based on what my heart wants, rather than what my body will allow me to do. the three years between my college graduation and now have been an extended pause, one that has thrown curveball after curveball, a whole plethora of challenge and discipline and reward. eight months ago, i threw myself back into the work force following a completely different path than the one i had been carefully following for most of my life—  i started working as a bartender. it was a mistake. i was devoting every ounce of my energy to a cause that left me feeling soulless and exhausted at the end of each very long night. i didn’t have enough energy or optimism to ward off the negativity that runs rampant within the bar scene and it got under my skin. i was too tired and weighed down by all the bullshit that i struggled to pursue life as an artist and i consequently found myself becoming more and more of a Jaded New York Bartender— a rare and overwhelmingly angry breed of human— and less of a person with a future as bright and full of art (and, frankly, happiness) as the one i think i’m destined to have. it’s so easy to get sidetracked in the all-encompassing “here" that is new york in your twenties. 

it’s easy to care too much about what inconsequential people think, to let others’ opinions dictate your choices. it’s easy to become too sensitive, to say things you don’t mean, to get mixed into the wrong crowd, to forget what’s important and start worrying too much about money, about other peoples’ business.

right now, i’m taking a break and looking around. a month ago, i was ready to get out of the city, to leave the east coast, to start over somewhere new with my cozy little family, just the three of us. tonight, though, i’m feeling pretty content. 

what’s important is gus, this sweet little bundle of fur curled up next to me. what’s important is the sound of r’s guitar singing through the wall. our apartment is speckled with photographs of us that are old enough to be memories— those are important. not remembering exactly where we were or who we were with, but how happy and awake and alive we were back at the beginning of it all. that’s what’s important.

nothing is flawless. no one is perfect. but here is good. 

here is exactly where i’m supposed to be.

things i do know:

- that hippos can run faster underwater than they can on land

- how to be a gracious hostess

- how to divide the house’s cash tips based on a point system.

- that i have found the love of my life

- how to swaddle a newborn

- what a humpback whale sounds like underwater

- how to measure and adjust another human’s blood sugar

- which way is west

- that i am figuring it out.