Mary Holscher

I back in and kick the orange door open with my heel. Breathe; thank you, God, for laundromats. For diapers. Push the door with my shoulder and back the stroller inside. I walked here in a chilly June rain, and the blast of humid air in the long room comforts me. I haul the stroller to a row of front-loading Speed Queens. Retrieve the plastic bag of dirty diapers from the stroller and stick the whole thing inside a washer’s maw. Dump it and shake the moist lumps out.

I am twenty-one and live on Capitol Hill in Seattle with my two-month-old baby and my sister. My weekly luxury is to come here on Tuesday afternoons while my sister babysits. I’m in my favorite daffodil-yellow T-shirt. I’ve center-parted my flyaway curls. Tied my red paisley scarf around my head.

It’s a boon that the stuffed plastic bag fills the stroller, and I have to leave my baby at home. I never mind dipping each shitty cloth in the toilet and swishing it around. I am grateful for the stink and stain I can’t wash out by hand.

I don’t yet know I want to send a signal: I am luscious.

I don’t know how hopeless this is when tossing dirty diapers into

the industrial machine.

I tug a quarter from my jeans pocket. Stick it in the vending machine. Extract an orange packet of Tide. I probe for four more quarters, secure each into a slot, and shove the silver handle. The washer makes its mechanical noises and starts to fill.

I grab the window seat. My dripping hair leaves damp spots on my shirt. I look down to see if the dampness has made my nipples visible. I look up to see a guy in a leather vest with a wet laundry-stuffed pillowcase enter and glance at me. I lean against the window and smile.

I don’t yet know that the ardor of my gaze startles strangers.

I have no idea I am radiant with need.

I twist my body to look at the street. I press my cheek against the expanse of glass. The people bustle by on Broadway’s crowded sidewalk. No one seems to mind the rain. A mascaraed girl in a tight red miniskirt dawdles takes a drag from her joint. She passes, and I see the bulge and sway of each round, fleshy invitation. A teenager with frayed bellbottoms presses his crotch while French kissing his girlfriend. A kid giggles and moves his lips like a goldfish as his mother tugs him away. My cheek presses against the window, and I see a scarlet triangle form in my reflection.

I want to drift like smoke into all the hubbub. I want the world to take me, inhale me like weed.

I jump up to check my washer. Count down the final three minutes. Wrench the heavy round door and pull out the diapers. Perfume of dampness, laundry soap, popcorn, and cigarette smoke. I load the wet diapers in the dryer, slide in two quarters, and find one more to treat myself to a bag of popcorn. I shove in kernels as bits of popcorn wedge between my teeth. I lick my salty lips, then rub with the back of my hand.

I finally take the load out of the dryer. I press the soft, hot whiteness against my cheeks. I sing “Sisters of Mercy” under my breath— “They will bind you with love that is graceful and green as a stem.”

Last night, I pressed my still-squishy belly against my mattress and willed myself to sleep. Later, when my baby cried, I lifted her from the bassinet to my bed. I relish her tug on my nipple, the milky homey scent. She sleeps in my arms with a trust as heavy as death.

I don’t yet know that my heart’s jumble leaps out of every pore,

shines even at night, even in bed covered by blankets.

            My baby has tiny ears and an elegant head shaped like her father’s. I wish her father hadn’t moved away. I wish he loved me.

I wish my baby would disappear Saturday night. I would fly like an angel hungry for heaven. Fly to a bar and meet a man with big hands and a slow voice who would touch my cheek and ask my name. He would laugh just before he kissed me. Nothing would exist but his urgent lips, his tongue.

Mary Holscher has (modestly) published both flash and short form memoir. Her first short memoir, “Unwed Mother, 1970” was in the anthology Single Mother’s Companion (Seal Press, 1994). A retired psychologist, she is intrigued by what moments stay vividly in memory and why. @maryholscher