Wild Card | Natashia Minto

Wild Card

by Natashia Minto

I am the dealer of this hand but I forgot to deal myself in.

The sun slithered across my flat bare chest as sweat collected on my body like raindrops. Ferns and dry leaves crumbled under my half naked body, releasing their strong scents in the air. The gritty feel of the moist dirt. The loud chirps of the birds and the deep croaks of the male frogs. Those feelings, those sounds, and the stickiness from the hot humid air will forever be engrained in my skin and in my nostrils. I laid on my back waiting for his twelve-year-old body to get on top of me.

We were grinding our small body parts together. Our shirts were off but out pants stayed on. We call it “haunching” where I’m from.

Neither one of us knew how to kiss but somehow we made awkward motions towards each other’s lips. He had full lips, but his breath was stale and blended with the air around me, engulfing my skin. He rubbed the little knots I had on my chest. I liked the way this new feeling made me feel. My ten-year-old body craved something that the mouth couldn’t explain and the heart couldn’t explore. Was it love? Was it acceptance? Was it touch? Was it all three? Maybe my heart desired to be touched in ways that my body had never known. I knew I couldn’t explore the depths of these feelings, especially not after starting my menstrual cycle at the age of nine and being told I was now a “young woman”. The only thing I had seen come from “young women” were babies.

I was a face card and a seven of hearts (seventeen) and I had broken the cycle of not getting pregnant at the age of fifteen. I knew that my friend’s dad and mom checked me out often and I liked it. We made comments about how we would sleep with each other if the time was ever right, but the time just never seemed to be right. Early May days in Georgia are just the right temperature. Hot, but not too hot. Sticky, but not too sticky. Swimming parties, bright lights, and chlorine filled pool, BBQ chicken on the grill and tequila swirled around in the air. Until this point, I had only drunk with my mama and my best friend. I didn’t know my limits. I didn’t know my body had limits. We took shot after shot. One, three, five, and seven. Seven. I stopped at seven. We were fifteen, sixteen, seventeen-year-olds with two thirty-six-year-old adults throwing the shots back. My seventeen-year-old body had only known sweat, torn ACLs and one ruptured ovarian cyst. But with forgettable amounts of tequila shots my seventeen-year-old body became clouded and staggered to find a place to lay down without drowning myself in the pool. His thirty-six-year-old body found me lying on one of the twin beds in a tiny bedroom. His thirty-six-year-old body could handle more. Knew more. But couldn’t care less about what mine had yet to learn. We were surrounded by pink walls, two twin beds, and college softball posters. He leaned in to kiss me.

“Where is your wife”? I asked.

He said, “Don’t worry about her, she’ll join the next time.”

I became a little excited that he said there would be a next time because I was more attracted to his wife than to him. He kissed me again. He saw in my eyes that I didn’t know what to do. That my body was filled out and aged like a grown woman, but the area between my legs had never been touched. So he said, “Get on your knees and I’ll tell you what to do.” He gave me instructions on how to suck his flaccid dick. I had never done that before and I would never do it again. I was immediately filled with shame and regret. Shame from the act that I performed and regret because he was a married man. But I couldn’t stop. I had to keep going to finish what I started. I had to know if that feeling that I was searching for was at the end of that moment. But it wasn’t. I wondered if my seventeen-year-old body craved the same type of touch as my ten year-old body did years ago.

The shame and regret of this act and many other actions lingered in my body for at least 20 years of my life and I searched after a feeling that I thought would fill me up and satiate the thirst. The feeling that went beyond any physical aspects. The feeling that swaddled me with no expectations. In the midst of rearranging the deck of cards I realized I was seeking my mother’s and family’s love. I sought after it in my friendships and relationships and I was always left unsatisfied, unfulfilled and feeling unwanted. I was let down due to my own expectations of how I thought they should love me. Why couldn’t these friends and partners be the wild card in this shitty as hand I was given? Later, why couldn’t I leave an unhealthy relationship with a woman we continued on and off for five years? I wanted to believe she loved me. That the years we spent together were not just wasted time, because they weren’t. I wouldn’t allow that to be my truth. I guess we both loved the idea of what we could be together and ignored the reality of what we were together. A trauma-filled relationship with no boundaries and high levels of validation required from each other. I felt I was never allowed to be fully vulnerable, completely naked because she couldn’t handle my big emotions, and she wasn’t allowed to be herself, because I didn’t know how to contain her rage. So I tucked my heart away so that my tears didn’t desire the need to express themselves. Rest themselves on this beautiful brown skin. Even now I have the hardest times with crying, because my tears are so used to being held in.

In this span of continuously reshuffling the old deck I decided to buy a new deck of cards. With each new shuffle, many emotions seeped through every pore of my skin. My heart thudded louder lub dub, lub dub because this time, with this new deck, I decided to deal myself in. I changed the game. I decided to play solitaire. I strategically set myself up to win. I am my own wild card which allows me to release my mom, my family, my ex and all the things I expected for them to be. I realize now that people can only go as far as their depths go, everything else are simply expectations and desires I have placed upon them.

Ive looked back at that ten-year-old child that desired the touch, the love, the long swaddles and I hold her, I speak kindly to her. I lay sweet kisses on her forehead. I remind her of herself, of her beauty and the things she will be. I sit with that seventeen-year-old as she lays her head on my shoulder and I allow her to release her fears and shames within me. Then, I look at this twenty-nine-year-old and I see how far I have come. I see the beautiful boundaries I have set for myself. I see how far I’ve grown in self-love, self-esteem and confidence. There are still times when I battle with myself at my old games. The negative chatter in my brain with the invisible rules of this new game as a wild card. A card that was meant to be disregarded but now somehow continuously shows up throughout my new deck. I kindly remind myself that I am the dealer of this hand and I will always get the first cards to deal myself in.

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ABOUT THE AUTHORESS

Natashia Minto

Nastashia Minto is the author of Naked: The Rhythm and Groove of It. The Depth and Length to It. Her work has appeared in SUSAN and the Unchaste Anthology, and she is a popular featured reader at Portland reading series including Unchaste Readers, Grief Rites, and Incite. An African American woman born in South Georgia and raised there by her grandparents, she grew up in poverty and around drugs, alcohol, and family violence. Her life experiences led her to obtain an associate’s degree in occupational therapy and a bachelor’s degree in psychology. Natashia has been writing since she was nine years old, and has found that her writing offers her a way to help others.