Naugatuck Valley Community College
BLOCK SECOND PLACE Emily Smith* Exhausted, the woman walked through the door into her silent house feeling discouraged from a long day which had left a stale taste in her mouth. The relief that she should have felt walking through the door was negated by apathy. She tried to see past the swarm of pessimistic thoughts, but they poured into her space like rats, sabotaging her every attempt to unwind; gnawing at her ankles and lurking in the corners, awaiting her acknowledgement. Frustrated, she rubbed the corners of her jaw trying to relax her tensed facial muscles. With stiff and heavy movements, she lumbered into the hallway, grabbed her towel off of the railing, and stomped up the stairs; her whole weight crashing down onto each step along the way. It seemed unreasonable how much more exhausted she felt after climbing those 12 steps. She couldn’t turn the shower on fast enough once she reached the bathroom. With urgency, she unpacked herself from the tight and abrasive confines of her clothing. Itching irritations peppered her skin beneath the wires and straps of her bra, and her waist was tattooed with a red ring where her dress pants had pinched her sides and belly. She stretched and cracked her toes as she kicked her pumps aside. Peeling off her glasses, which had nearly adhered themselves to the bridge of her nose, she carefully tucked her neatly styled hair into an uncomfortable plastic shower cap, anxiously waiting for the shower’s steam to fill the bathroom; finding comfort in imagining it hanging like fog around her nude body. As she pulled the shower curtain closed, she exhaled deeply with relief, feeling safe and warm in her one and only sanctuary. In there, her phone wasn’t ringing, she wasn’t thinking about the mess that needed to be cleaned up, or the bills that needed to be paid, and she didn’t need to attend to anyone but herself. Stepping into that hot shower was like turning the clock to 2 am; in the silence she was momentarily freed from the challenges of life. Maybe without distraction, that perfect idea would finally come to her. Eventually, she would need to come up with something. She sat down, cross legged and allowed the water to fall onto her; it was so scalding hot that it turned her skin pink. The countless small hot droplets collided forcefully with the surface of 73
