Please Take

Communal courtyard, velcro-rough walls, smell of damp, shelf of books outside with a label: please take. The books were my father's. My neighbour Gen holds a queerpunk night where I meet Bex, butch & shy & soft-featured & chunky-bodied. That night she grazes her knees on the walls.

All-night garage. I have a ball-pein hammer in my coat pocket. Gen & Bex discuss rawl plugs which makes me uncomfortable & they make me hold the drinks because I've kissed them both but actually I haven't kissed either of them. I wish I had.

Drinking tea with Bex. The future seems mapped, glued mohawks & photocopied zines & ruling queer nightclubs like queens. She will listen, really listen. She will play me songs on her acoustic guitar at open mic nights and she'll be too shy to dedicate them to me but I'll know. I'll just know.

 We move to a city brickbox and already I'm fictionalising the gaps. I leave the ball-pein. All my father's books are gone and I wish I'd left the please off the sign.