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A Girl Should Write her Own Poetry
March 1954
“The first thing you should know about me is that I’m a witch.”
I practiced saying the words all morning, like a mantra. “The first thing,” I said between swipes of crimson lipstick. “You should know about me,” I whispered through a haze of hairspray that held together my golden curls. “Is that I’m a witch,” I mouthed as I hooked my bra and slid on my nylons.
I rolled the words over my tongue until I felt the resonance of each consonant in my throat. I noted how my lips stuck in almost the exact same spot for the letters b and m, and loved when my tongue met the roof of my mouth as I tutted my t’s and th’s.
The sentence was it’s own sort of spell. Words wrapped and glowed around me until they began to lose all their meaning and my mind went hazy. What kind of word was ‘about’ anyway? How strange that my mouth had to twist so many different ways to say a word that meant almost nothing. And why did the ‘ou’ sound like a cat whining? I scratched the question down on a slip of paper and stuffed it inside my English book. I’d ask my professor later.
The volley of consonants that swirled around my head faded to nothing when the doorbell rang. Under a swish of crinoline and silk that scraped against my legs, I abandoned all thought of the word ‘know’ (the silent k was another conundrum that I’d examine at a later date) and ran to the door, positioning myself exactly in the middle so that the golden light of the sun would reflect off me like a halo.
Hugh Darling was the kind of guy a girl liked to see show up at her door. He was athletic, but not a jock, quiet and thoughtful, but not meek, and tall enough for a woman to cling to, but not so tall that he towered over her. His dark hair was perfectly combed and parted, and so thick that I suspected it’d go gray with elegance rather than thin with shame. Best of all, he had a good family name and a major that’d land him a house in the suburbs one day.
With his hands stuffed into his pockets, and wry smile playing on his lips, he swept his eyes from my face, to my feet, and made his way back up again. Inwardly, I smiled. I’d been as ambitious with my dress as he’d been with his invitation. His eyes widened at the soft dusting of blue silk gauze, and his gold flecked irises lingered over the plunge of my v-neck before landing back on my face.
“Samantha.” There was no hesitation, no question in his tone. Only a statement. His deep voice resonated in the pit of my stomach.
“Sam,” I corrected. It was a nickname. Boyish, and at odds with the dress that swayed like a meadow when I walked, but it was the nickname given me as a child by my grandmother. One I was not ready to part with.
Smiling, he nodded. “Shall we?”
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