Women’s Weight

The words “fat girl” burn in the mouth like cussing. Mom will frown at her swollen ankles, she will say she’s got the legs of a fat person. My older sister Tanya will be a failed ballerina, a laxative binger, an anorexic with too many curves. At the bar her maestro will pinch her flat belly, her plumb line; she will shake her head, and move on to the next fifteen-year-old dancer. Aunt Carolyn will eat and eat and eat and stop eating until she gets a new boyfriend. “My extra weight is a defense mechanism,” she’ll say. I once saw her cry over a burrito. I felt worried. We were on vacation.

Lately my roommates and I will watch episodes, old seasons of our favorite shows, between work shifts and classes. The women are funny and have tiny little waists, of course; we all have our favorite female character. Not an episode goes by without one of the girls sitting next to me on the couch saying, “She is so thin.” Sometimes I’ll say, “Yeah,” or sometimes I’ll say nothing and stare ahead and wonder if that’s really what they’re thinking. Once I replied, “She is a small person.” “Yeah, but she is so thin!” they’ll say again. The female characters are all thin; unbelievably beautiful I defend them, I yearn to become them, at least between showering and filtering coffee in the morning.

Inheriting my mother’s legs, my father’s jowly Italian face, my aunt’s full bust, I will look through pictures of my sixteen-year-old self and pout and wish I could rewind to when I was young and thin and danced salsa, unembarrassed, when I didn’t despise food and when I was as pretty as my tan, brunette, big-eyed sister, legs like a goddess. When I was sixteen I worried I was afraid no one would ever want to have sex with me. So of course I tried to have sex as soon as possible, which I did.

“Women are in their prime between the ages of eighteen and twenty-one,” my friend Theresa said knowingly, at age nineteen. I was eighteen. Theresa was fat. She was pretty too. “I need to start my diet but, like, I’ve still got time, my goal is to be one hundred and thirty by next Christmas. Men are in their prime later, when they’re twenty-five, when they’ve got that full man face, you know? I’m going to marry an older man anyway, and I’m young.” Thank goodness I still have time too, I thought to myself, fearful for both of us that we would never lose the weight.

Lacking the control to stop eating for a couple days straight, abandoning the 6am gym regime with the last rays of summer, I instead focus my energy on prayers for skinniness. I yearn to see the topography of my hands, to wear my shirt tight over my ribs. I want to be monkey-face skinny. I want the legs of a normal person. I want to feel like a woman. I want someone to want to have sex with me. I want to not want food. I want my mother to tell me I look good. I want to inspire my sister and impress Theresa. I want to feel happy. I don’t want to be a fat girl anymore.

June day, sitting at the shore of the Sandy River, the day so beautiful it could have been plastic, or a painting. Feet in the water, my roommate and I talk about relationships. “I guess I don’t believe that any man would ever be attracted to me,” my friend says, swinging her legs. I look up at her: a beautiful girl, she has huge blue eyes and a huge full gut. She does not wear makeup and she does not worry about what to wear. I could have cried. She shrugged.

Winner of the Lee Sharkey Creative Writing Award Fall 2010
University of Maine Farmington RIPPLE Magazine
© Kate Chianese 2010

When We Reminisce

It was a small gathering in his apartment above the florist. Liz Jones whipped out her violin and played some Gaelic melodies in honor of St. Patrick’s Day. I was wearing a green undershirt, and it would only be a matter of time before my jacket would fall to the floor, better to dance without it. By that time, only four of us dancing; the violin packed away, the beers brought across the street to be cracked open cross legged on the floor of another furniture-less apartment. Here, in the whirring light of the monitor, David would play another song, and Jo would call out, “Four-way kiss!” We’d lean in, bump faces. After another round of lime Jell-o shots, another green beer for Jo, Dave, and Thompson, the Fortress would call to us. Pushing together the two faded blue couches, the Fortress took up the whole living room; we sank into the lumpy seats, the far corner sagging heavily from the time when Thompson stood on it. “Thompy! Trade with me!” Jo would exclaim, and make Thompson sit in the sunken corner. After our eyes began to droop, after Jo lit a bowl in her rainbow pipe, Bo, the air and smoke would mix with the acoustics and we’d confess our thoughts; how Thompson missed a girl named Christine; how David was still in love with his ex for ten months, ten months, he said it unbelieving. Late that night, squished together in the living room, drafty from the high rattling windows, I felt an ant crawl on my back—no—someone running a finger gently, gently along my skin. I froze. I couldn’t help but admire his persistence, however; his fingers beginning to press more firmly against my back, but without delay. Breath held, he absorbed my skin for over an hour; slowly tracing my spine, my hip, over my stomach.

*

It was a small gathering in the apartment above the wood shop. Eric Carter whipped out his own personal shot glass and a near-empty bottle of rum in honor of Halloween. I was wearing an antique over shirt, the only costume-like clothing in my heaping closet, and it would only be a matter of time before my jacket would fall to the floor, better to move that way. By that time, only a few of us sitting on the couches and chairs in the living room; Liza perched on the ledge above the stairs, Kylie and Kim leaning towards each other on the couch, Rodney had his feet up on the lobster trap. Taking another sip of wine or rum or tequila, or glancing at the whirring monitor where the Shining played quietly, we confessed our thoughts; how Rodney was crazy in his freshmen year, how he regretted dropping out of college; how Kylie had been so religious she did not make time for friends—now she just wanted a boyfriend, she wanted her first kiss; how Liza claimed she used to be a hermit in college, and Kim was just plain angry, dating a boy who was bad for her. I lingered on the edge of my chair by the kitchen, listening, my mind drifting to my own first year at college, when I didn’t know this apartment, these people, when I was still roommates with Jo and we still talked. When I was dating David and the group of us would float down the Sandy River in a thunderstorm, or dance in his moldy kitchen, or when just the two of us would lie in his six-hundred-dollar bed and listen to the courthouse chime and talk about music, literature, philosophy, college. David broke up with me before leaving for France, and he had already been gone ten months. Ten months. I thought about it unbelieving. The high windows whistled softly, breaking my thoughts, and I remembered how the spiders came pouring in that summer, babies spreading over the couches and lamps; every so often you’d feel something prickle up your arm—you’d slap the spider on instinct or give out a little shriek—or sometimes, breath held, you’d lay your arm on the window sill and wait for the baby spider to trace its way back to the screen.

© Kate Chianese 2010

Beauty

is torching an infestation
of baby black widows
or
the little hairs
of a feminine forearm.


Published in the Sandy River Review fall 2009 issue
© Kate Chianese 2009

Raindrop Prelude

what is rain
to a man in thought?
thoughts caught in monsoons
soon to be sheltered by palms
palms never entirely dry.

what is water
to a man in love?
love's a woman, music
unlocks her as D-flat major.
minor unhinges him as the C-sharp
Chopin parallels her.

what is the tide
to a man in Majorca?
major storm a fortissimo
forgoing the gentle patter
patterned ostinato of A-flat
A-flat enlivened by B-flat
and back and back.

what is a river
to a man with drowned lungs?
lunging hands in chords, presto
pressing the ivory to give it some color.
colorless he sits drained of energy
entranced by her, however,
ever propped at the piano.

what is the faintest trickle
to a man slowly dying?
da capo al fine
fingers dripping over the melody
mellow and sweet
switching to his thumbs
thumbing the black keys.

© Kate Chianese 2010

Sostenuto

a thirty year old man
she was four years old.
played only the black keys.
his daughter couldn’t read
so he was her eyes.
the composer told her
to use her ears.

it started out as a conversation
a few questions. trills. intonations.
an impressive display of teeth
coughing up fricatives,
octaves, nachtmusik.

that time it rained
a gap in the roof
turned maple varnish into
cracked alligator skin
and the high C fell silent.

arpeggios outgrew
the wingspan of her hands.
Baby Grand Baldwin
could no longer be tuned.

Hamilton was wheeled away
now stood Yamaha
glinting black, reserved,
no fingerprints.

without the composer
she longs
to do the hammers some justice.
maybe she'll have a talk
with the satin ebony, maybe
she'll learn Schubert
to ring the house
with chords again.


Published in the Sandy River Review fall 2009 issue

© Kate Chianese 2009

Why We Plan for the Future (fiction excerpt)

Something about the angle of his eyes. Or the angle of the lights, dimmed and reddened as they were in the coffee shop that evening. Linelle wasn’t sure what to make of the man at the other end of the table; he was quick to talk about himself but strange in what he chose to say; “I don’t talk about certain things,” he said sharply, “I don’t talk about my past relationships,” (he ticked them off on his fingers), “my time in the army, or my connection with my family.” What else was there to talk of? You’d think he’d ask her more questions. After all she was the one still only twenty (well, she was really nineteen but she told him twenty). Later, Linelle couldn’t recall him asking her any questions. It was three months later, back at the same coffee shop, that he finally had a bunch of questions to ask.
“Can I get you another coffee, lady?”
“No thanks, I’m good.”
“Was work alright?”
“It was fine.”
“Have you talked to your folks lately?” He was reaching for her hand. He was always reaching for her hand these days.
“I’ll probably call them this weekend. Why, you talked to yours lately?”
“Now it’s not a time to joke, ya know, lady.” He let go of her hand.
It was still light out and a glowing beam sneaked through the blinds to strike Linelle in the eyes; she thought of asking him to close the shades but she didn’t.
She watched his face as he looked around the café, hesitating on an older woman sunk in a plush red sofa, eating her whipped cream straight off the top of her mocha cup. He sighed and Linelle knew he wanted to go smoke a cigarette.
“I know you’re not sure yet, but in the end the decision is yours, I can’t force you one way or another.” He was looking her in the face now.
Her mouth was dry. Maybe it was the chocolate chip muffin she had eaten.
He started tapping his foot. A moment later he slipped out his lighter and said he’d be right back.
She watched him smoke through the glass window behind the whipped-cream-eating woman. Linelle could remember their conversation in the coffee shop the first time they sat to “talk things over.” He had smelled strongly of cigarette smoke and cologne; she remembered breathing it in when he stepped too close to her, not looking down at her face, but browsing the art on the walls. “Now help me understand,” he had said calmly, “This painting is marked 1000. Is that its price?” She replied that she figured so but she was mostly preoccupied with whether or not to take a step back from him. She finally did, but then took a step forward again on afterthought. She didn’t want him thinking his age bothered her.
“Whatcha thinking about, lady?”
Linelle looked up; he was back, sitting down, that cologne-cigarette smell more powerful than ever.
“I dunno,” she said absentmindedly. “What to do, I guess.”
He sat up straighter in his chair. She hoped he wasn’t going to try to take her hand again.
“Like I said,” (she winced inwardly as he took her hand from its place behind the napkins), “You wouldn’t have to visit. No obligations. I’d never ask for money. I know you’re a young one and are probably all worried about your future and everything, college and whatnot—”
“I’m graduating before you are.” Her voice was dull.
He petted her hand in his. His fingertips were rough, callused. Her hands sweated.
“Okay,” he said. “Lady, just listen. It’s just an option. We needn’t even talk again. I mean, we both know we’re not going to talk again. I’ll let you alone, it’d be like nothing ever happened. You could go on with your life, either way.”
There was something about his eyes, though; they looked kind enough from where he sat across from her, but by this point she would rather look away. All those dinners she had looked across to him, catching his eye during meetings, staring into his face in the dark before going to sleep. She busied herself by mixing her coffee, decaf today; cutting out caffeine was something to get used to.
“I know I don’t have an obligation to visit or be involved,” she said to the table simply. But she knew he was watching her stir her drink. Linelle hadn’t forgotten that evening at the café when he told and did not tell her about himself. Relating broken details of his time in Europe, his divorces, how his most recent ex wife took all his wine glasses: “You should come over for a drink but oh, I should probably buy us wine glasses, the ex took them all.” She hadn’t forgotten the babies, either. One falsely claimed to be his, another one born dead. She stopped stirring her coffee, watching the milky liquid swish to a halt. She didn’t want to look into his eyes.
“I’m growing old. You wouldn’t have to do anything. I would hire a nanny. You know I’d make a good father. Our son would be safe and well cared for. He’ll grow up disciplined and educated. But I understand this is your thing. You do whatever you want.”



Published in the Sandy River Review spring 2011 issue

© Kate Chianese 2011