When I was younger, I found a secret in a science book before my mother had a chance to explain it to me herself. In my bedroom, I studied the diagram of what my flat chest would become, how a whole network of fat and feeling would bloom beneath the skin without my permission. In the pictures, the breast was a flower—the lobes like purple petals connected to the light pink nipple. This rendering softened my initial fears of invasion; on the inside at least, this flowering could be beautiful.
After I’d bloomed my mother taught me how to examine my breasts, said you should know your body better than anyone.To demonstrate, she raised her left hand, pressed her left breast with the other hand. Later, alone in my room and in bed, I practiced beneath my oversized t-shirt. The fat of my breast rolled beneath my hand’s inquiry. I stirred small circles down to the muscle until I memorized the feeling. I pressed, poked, and pinched until I was sore.
Now, a little after 2 AM, I palm my left breast the way a man might, find it tender. I let my fingertips ride the dense waves until I hit a bump that does not shift with the rest of the fat. I pass over it from different angles, but the result remains. I rest my palm there as if it will tell me something, introduce itself, and I think of everything the world has said about this part of me. How once before, I Googled “dense breasts” and the internet told me sometimes,it feels like you are made of heavy rope—don’t be alarmed. How my lover says I love how they’ve gotten biggerthese past few years without understanding the consequences of more.
When I was younger, I found a secret in a science book before my mother had a chance to explain it to me herself. In my bedroom, I studied the diagram of what my flat chest would become, how a whole network of fat and feeling would bloom beneath the skin without my permission. In the pictures, the breast was a flower—the lobes like purple petals connected to the light pink nipple. This rendering softened my initial fears of invasion; on the inside at least, this flowering could be beautiful.
After I’dbloomed my mother taught me how to examine my breasts, said you should know your body better than anyone.To demonstrate, she raised her left hand, pressed her left breast with the other hand. Later, alone in my room and in bed, I practiced beneath my oversized t-shirt. The fat of my breast rolled beneath my hand’s inquiry.I stirred small circles down to the muscle until I memorized the feeling. I pressed, poked, and pinched until I was sore.
Now, a little after 2 AM, I palm my left breast the way a man might, find it tender.I let my fingertips ride the dense waves until I hit a bump that does not shift with the rest of the fat. I pass over it from different angles, but the result remains. I rest my palm there as if it will tell me something, introduce itself, and I think of everything the world has said about this part of me. How once before, I Googled “dense breasts” and the internet told me sometimes,it feels like you are made of heavy rope—don’t be alarmed. How my lover says I love how they’ve gotten biggerthese past few years without understanding the consequences of more.
“Lump” originally appeared in Alien Literary Magazine and is reprinted here with kind permission of the author.
