Samantha Szumloz
Aliens
The kitchen is dead. So is the boulevard outside my window. I look down at the bonfire beneath my apartment, the biggest and most vibrant source of light on the sidewalk. It burns my eyes. I live above a Chickies & Pete’s, which means that there is always some sort of faint commotion below—a frat guy’s howl, an Eagles fan’s cursing, a wine mom’s cackle. Their sounds travel in and out of the restaurant like clockwork, and I listen from above like an owl on her perch, standing in my bra and sweatpants with a pint of chocolate ice cream in my hands like a careless bitch. I know I’m not a careless bitch at heart. Sometimes I like to be one, though, whenever I’m snacking in my bra and sweatpants.
Another thing about my apartment is that it is right across from a five-story parking garage. A winding staircase can be seen through the thick glass windows of the place. The stairs look eerie in the pale lighting. I’m about to turn around and put my ice cream back in the fridge when my eye catches two guys running down the steps.
They are college students; I can tell. Their backpacks hang loose on their backs as they sprint like scared teenagers in a slasher movie. The guy behind grabs the front guy’s bag, tugs, and pulls him back, sending him falling on his ass. The perpetrator freezes in his tracks. I’m numb. I imagine a cracked skull hanging off one of the steps, leaking blood. But a flood of relief crashes over me when the fallen man springs back up, laughing and all smiles. The other man laughs back. How are they both laughing?
The fallen guy sprints down the stairs again as if nothing happened. His friend doesn’t move. His smile fades. He stands in front of the window, panting, gulping air. He has wispy blonde hair down to his earlobes. He is white in the pale light, extremely white like a paper sheet. He is wearing a black tank top with the word “BEEFY” on the chest. I don’t get why some guys wear shirts like that. I can see their massive arms, their tight calves, their veins bulging out of their limbs. Why do they need to wear cheesy t-shirts to prove that they’re jacked?
The panting guy does something unexpected: he looks out the window, locking eyes with me across the street. He sees me, and I see him. We have caught each other in our vulnerabilities. The thing is, I don’t feel vulnerable. I feel like I am staring at a statue, something not breathing. Am I inhuman to him at this moment, too? Is everyone inhuman before they open their mouths, before they get a chance to explain themselves?
In this case, from this distance, opening our mouths to speak is impossible. As long as we keep staring at each other like this, we are aliens, aliens with no dialogue. I can wave to him. I can mouth something to him. I can pull a Taylor Swift and write him a message on a drawing pad. I can abandon this discomfort.
I don’t want to do any of these things.
Instead, I do this: I turn around and put my ice cream in the fridge. I move backward until I am a few inches from the window. I unclasp my bra. It lands on the floor. I roll my shoulders around and crack my neck, raise my arms in the air without looking back. I let my shoulder blades talk to the man. After I stretch, I walk out of the kitchen and turn right into my bedroom. That is when I glance over my shoulder. The guy is now a dot in the garage window, still watching, waiting for me to come out.
I hope he knows now that he’s made of flesh and bone, just as I am made of flesh and bone.
Samantha Szumloz is a poet, fiction writer, Glassworks Associate Editor, and Writing Arts student at Rowan University. She has been published in places such as MORIA, Blue Marble Review, Belladonna’s Garden, Moonstone Press, The Talon Review, Villain Era Lit, and more. She is also a recipient of the Inaugural Senior of Distinction Award for Literary Citizenship in her major. To read more of Sam’s work, follow her on LinkedIn and Instagram (@poemsbysammsy).
Banner Art:
Photo by Matthew Jackson, Unsplash, 2024
