by Christy Hartman
The saleswoman convinced me that women my age could wear a two-piece. Retro-style, black with white polka dots. “You’ve earned those curves, wear them with pride.” Body-positivity is a peer pressure I had not anticipated. This morning I removed the tags from my new loose black cover-up and perched oversized sunglasses on fresh caramel highlights, examining myself in the mirror. The reflection looked vaguely like me.
My sweat-slick thighs rub together, pedicured toes raking through the hot sand with each lumbering step. We spent many summer days at this beach, hauling coolers, buckets and towels for family fun that would end with tears, sunburns, and popsicles. I arrange my body on a striped blanket and watch my daughter chase her own wild daughter through the sand.
A flock of girls, sun-browned limbs stretching for miles, pose for selfies at the water’s edge. A lifetime ago I was one of them, thriving in that golden time between child and adult. My wings spread wide, I flew across the sand, seaweed scented air tingling my nostrils. I’d launch myself into the ocean. Into the embrace of a chasing boy or dancing waves, whichever caught me first. The version of me before babies and heartbreak, stretchmarks, and cellulite.
I leave the security of metres of black linen crumpled on my towel. The confidence of age and experience evaporates as eyes, real and imagined, burn into the strip of soft flesh between the spandex of my polka-dot suit. Sun and shame paint my cheeks fiery crimson as I reach the water’s edge.
The ocean licks my toes. Heavy legs carry me forward until they are feather light. Saltwater fills my curves and crevices with gratitude, cradling this body that carries me through life. I float on my back.
Suspended.
Ageless
Weightless.
Christy Hartman pens short fiction from her home between the ocean and mountains of Vancouver Island Canada. She writes about the chasm between love and loss and picking out the morsels of magic in life’s quiet moments. Christy has been shortlisted for Bath and Bridport Flash Fiction prizes and is a New York City Midnight winner. She has been published by Elegant Literature, Sci-Fi Shorts, Fairfield Scribes, and others.
January House Literary Journal 
Leave a reply to Erin Brandt Filliter Cancel reply