Clean

JENNY. My dreams are better than my reality. And they're vivid. So, so vivid. By the time I wake up, I've lived more than Liz Taylor. I've been rich and I've been famous and I've been prettier than Marilyn fucking Monroe. But then there's morning, where there's the overwhelming feeling (day after day after day) that I have been splattered in blue paint by Jackson Pollock on a rainy Monday.

I take my first hot shower of the day and avoid the mirror completely. Which is easy, considering I covered them all up months ago, like I'm sitting fucking Shiva. Shiva for some part of me that got left there in the wreckage. I wait til there is steam and the water has reached a too-hot point and I step inside. Ssssss. My skin sizzles like an egg on a sidewalk in August. The blue paint has rinsed off and finds its way down the drain, swirling round and round until it disappears completely. Until tomorrow morning when it's back. On my hands. On my neck. On my back. On my legs. I wash furiously with an apricot scrub. It's grainy. Coarse. A little tough on the skin, but that's necessary to truly get clean. Sterile, is how my shrink likes to put it. It's always followed by a condescending this too shall pass.

To tell you the truth, I'm not entirely sure why I still see her. We've tried a number of tactics, but none of them seem to work. There were the tell-me-how-you-feel puppets. I swear to God, I'd put a fucking sock puppet on my hand and tell her in the most ridiculous voice possible that my vagina had closed up for good. There was the take-home journal I'd only ever write dates in. Marking time. Stating I was alive. That I'd woken up that morning. We'd turn my chair around so I wasn't looking directly at her. She'd ask questions. I'd answer. I'd tell her that I got to the bagel store and back without panicking. That I watched a sitcom and okay, maybe I laughed twice. That I'd tried masturbating like she suggested but that I couldn't even get wet.

These people -- these doctors -- these shrinks --there is a saying for them. Those who can't DO, teach. Or some variation on that theme, obviously. Those who don't feel, live vicariously through others. And Carol -- sorry -- Doctor Gruber -- what the fuck does she know about what I went through? What it felt like to kneel there watching him sniffing my panties, jacking off on my -- no, LETTING -- yes, letting him jack off onto my face. And all the while he calls me his bitch. And his princess.

(Beat.)

He didn't even know my name.

(Beat.)

Doctor Gruber tried to distract me with board games. She wanted my competitive side to let my guard down. Monopoly to get me to talk. Backgammon to get me to say the word. Chess so I would slip up and admit to being raped.

(Beat.)

Or something like it.

(Beat.)

The first man I tried dating after it happened told me that it was only rape if the guy fucked me. And that since the guy didn't fuck me, I'd be just fine. I'd need some time. But by the salad course, my date already wanted a blowjob and I wanted to stab with him with a steak knife. Doctor Gruber suggested I try again. That dating -- and eventually making love -- would get easier. Over a game of Chinese Checkers, she asked if I had been masturbating. She suggested that I touch myself. Maybe just my thighs at first. Some light exploration. Had I seen my vagina recently? I went home, with a hand-mirror I'd stashed at the bottom of a drawer, looked at myself. And looked. And looked. And cried. And took my sixth shower of the day.

(Beat.)

Sweat has a very distinctive taste. It's salty. A liquid pretzel. But its scent changes. A hot summer day smells different than looking over your shoulder at midnight. Excitement smells sweeter than fear. And as that scent permeates -- you wonder, will he remember it? Can he track me down? Hunting me like a canine, sniff-sniff?! So, I shower. And I scrub. Apricot, peach, pear, eucalyptus, kiwi, watermelon, coconut, citrus grove, lemongrass, lemondrop, pomegranate, lavender, strawberry, cucumber-melon, every scent you can imagine. I've masked my image with sheets over mirrors. And I've masked my scent with a fucking farmer's market.

Fourteen times in one day is the record. We -- Doctor Gruber and I -- we've gotten that down to six. I've had the occasional bad day. I've thought, suspected someone was following me. You know how, when it rains, footsteps sound louder right after a storm? Then. Then I shower.

I shower fourteen times. Only ten showers less than the hours in a day. 24 hours. Twenty. Four. That's how many months it's been. That's two years. And in 730 days, I've taken nine thousand, one hundred and forty eight showers.

That's how I measure time. In blue paint and water and soap.