Pastor

In his car. It’s the dead of winter—cold, gray, bleak. It’s Christmastime. I’m in my special dress, the one I like the most. It’s black with these iridescent pink sequins that catch the light of the street lamps further down the street. He’s in his normal wear: a muddy brown suit and a pinstripe button-up. His car is off. I stare at the radio for a while because it has a tuning dial with a pointer, like the radios in old movies, and I’ve never seen one like that in real life before.

He’s talking, but I can’t hear him. He’s probably saying the nice things, probably buttering me up with compliments. I know what he wants. I wait for it. Eventually, he stops trying to be nice and unzips his pants.

He makes me take it in my mouth. I’m not here I’m not here. He makes me sit on it. My dress shimmers like a mermaid’s tail in the light as he moves me up and down.

I wasn’t the one who felt it, who took it. I was there and I remember it, but I was far away, closer to the back of the mind. When it was all said and done, I think I thought more about the dress than anything.