Her

Ophelia Klein

The smallest of moments, occurring in another small town. A mundane, everyday experience transcending simplicity—two girls walk into a Dollar General. Who knew holding hands could be an act of defiance?

They stroll one dimly lit aisle to the next, lights flickering as if placing a spotlight upon the pair. A person walks past, seemingly unobservant, and uninvited whispers of past threats rush in my mind. Unwelcome images flash of a couple, two girls holding hands in a mall in Hong Kong, that were stabbed to death in broad daylight while various shoppers turned into bystanders. The girls, who were later called “friends” by police and numerous statements reported by the press, fought for each other’s love and their lives. Another case of four women—two couples in Argentina who were killed when their home was set on fire while they were asleep—burns through my brain.

The random customer continues walking past and turns the corner, but I can’t tell if they took an extra couple seconds out of their day to notice the way I stand too close to her or the way my pinky grazes hers, asking for a promise of her to stay. She picks up a liter of soda, takes my hand, and keeps walking, scanning the shelves like it’s nothing. 

When she looks at me and squeezes my hand, I know that everything’s alright. I’ve always been afraid to be myself, to come out, but she lets me hold her hand in public, and for the first time, I’m not scared. For the first time, I don’t even think that it could somehow be considered wrong in the eyes of someone else, someone who wants to believe that we’re just best friends holding hands. Instead, I’m lost in her eyes, a gentle reassurance that she’s here for me, and I am so blissfully unaware. I’m lost in her scent that smells like the home I was never really granted—the home where I was told, “it’s just a phase,” “you don’t know what you’re talking about,” “you’ll change your mind” and that, “you’ll find the right man who can make you understand” the right ways, the way that I am not—until she and I found each other, and I immediately knew this was how it was supposed to be and how I was supposed to be. I look up for the first time in the cramped passageway, and I see the disapproving look someone gives me, someone who remains unknown to the both of us, and I glare at them, hold her hand tighter, willing them to try to take this, to take her, away from me. 

Loving her feels so right, I can’t see how anyone would ever think it was wrong. 

I wish I could imprint her fingerprints onto my skin to keep her close to me forever, etched onto my days and nights, like she’s etched into my thoughts. She is a spark of the divine, inspiring me to be the best person I can be, both for myself and her. And I claim to not be religious, but I’m so thankful to God for her. 

Though I don’t truly believe in a God, she is something holy that had to be sent to me of all the people who exist in this space at this moment when she looks at me. The way she looks at me and the chances of me finding her almost let me believe that there is a God that has favored me enough to let me find something so breathtaking, someone I can be honored by. 

I take pride in stating my convictions of her.

I will not regret setting aside this room in my chest, making space for her to sleep and stay there. I will never be ashamed of loving her wholeheartedly because loving a person like her will have never been a waste. I cherish the knowledge that this is not a mistake, that there can be no mistake about this. 

I only wish to convey utter genuineness towards her, and for her. 

And I used to think if nobody spoke to me that I would never speak again, but if I were with her and I never produced a singular word, she would read every muscle twitch in my face, every line in the palm of my hand, every crevice in my body, as I would do the same for her. She doesn’t just add days to my life by giving me reasons to stay here, but brings life to my days. I’m still so warm from her, long after she is not physically by my side.

I only wish we did not have to fear in loving each other openly. 

There is no telling what the future will bring, what people might try to deny us because of their construct of love. I know that, and I know the danger that lies staggering in the corner, people waiting for their chance to be able to tell me the way I love is immoral, yet it won’t change the certitude that I am in love. The imperilment stoops down just crawling around my feet, at certain times rising higher where it slowly begins to consume me and at others just grasping my ankles and waiting to pull me under, biding its time until it can be fed into. I hear that Obergefell v. Hodges, the fundamental right to marry, my decision to love her on paper, recognized by those who control us, sways in the balance of a world that is scared because to love another person this much surely cannot be fair to everyone else. Still, I will stay in love, as if it is a place, as if it is somewhere I could live. And if there was a place that I had to choose, it would always be her arms. 

Tell me, how do I look away now that I have seen her? How do I focus when I know what a state of completeness feels like? For they will have never known the depth that these words can hardly express when I am carrying out the smallest of moments, the mundane everyday experiences, but with a smile because I can’t help but to think of her. Everything she does is so effortless, yet so extraordinary. 

Loving her is the easiest thing I have ever done. Being with her feels like the most natural thing in the world. 

They couldn’t know the bliss I feel getting to be loved by her.

Ophelia Klein is currently a junior at Eastern Illinois University majoring in ELA. She specializes in forms of creative nonfiction, poetry, and realistic fiction writing. She has been published in The Vehicle and The American Library of Poetry with hopes to have her first novel published in the upcoming years.