gag reflex

My gag reflex is hyperactive. My doctor doesn’t know why. I wonder if it’s anything to do with the fact I set it off for fun, clawing at my uvula to see if it will get mad. It does get mad, spewing vomit everywhere like a burst pipe, and sometimes I like to sit there and observe the mess before I bleach the knees of my jeans cleaning it all up.

I saw my dad die on the way to school but I didn’t skip the day because I had english. We were holding hands and he choked on his own sick. His head cracked all over the pavement. Brown blood on my shoes. He smelled like whiskey. I don’t drink whiskey.

Throwing up burns up your insides. My organs are all medium-rare. Sometimes I cry when I pray. I pray for acid rain and I pray that it will scorch a hole so wide in my head that my brain will poke out, and I hope that the thick goopy bile that’s been building up in there will all pour out. It will smell bad. It will smell of sick and smouldering flesh and I crave the smell just like I crave vegan ice cream and my dad’s cold hands.

On bad days I beg my boyfriend to choke me. He doesn’t do it very well. It never leaves a mark. I don’t think he realises that I’m not being playful: I want to feel my trachea shut and I want to taste fear and I want to feel my face getting hot and desperate. I want to feel my body claw at life, rip off its nails trying to hold on. On good days he shoves his fingers down my throat and I suck on them before he touches the back of my tongue to make me vomit. He doesn’t mind the taste. It reminds him of me.