Bathroom Drawer

I was born two days after the fourth of July. I remember there was still firework powder on the floor when I came into being. 

Also, I’m a drawer, specifically a drawer in a bathroom cupboard. That fact is probably the more important of the two. 

When I was first installed, I was so excited. ME the new kid on the block, ready to be open and closed at a moment’s notice. 

It was only a few minutes in when I realized the problem. There was an obstruction. For days I wept. 

I should be clearer. Sometimes I explain things and forget that I’m not talking to another drawer. Or myself. An obstruction is something that stops you from opening all the way. For some that may mean they can open pretty much the whole way, so they’re pretty much fine. For others, like me, you’re locked in a tomb of darkness, broken only by the chance for a measly inch of light. 

I can open one inch. 

Some nights I would pray to God for death. It didn’t matter how; Termites, Fire, I just wanted release from my torment. I waited for drawer heaven.

In the early days, sometimes my owner would open me by accident. Looking for q-tips or some sort of lubricant. But he’d always shut me back up. Back to the darkness. He learned after a while which drawer I was, and then even the accidental openings stopped.

Then it was only darkness. 

The darkness eradicated all time. I stopped talking to my neighbors, or they stopped talking to me, it is hard to remember. I am a drawer after all. 

My hinges began to rust and the screws in me began to corrode. My wood started to deform, and a warm feeling of malaise became a blanket tucking me further and further into the depths. 

Then one day, the light came back. At first, I was blinded. Black nothingness was replaced with white nothingness, and then the features became clearer. There he was, my owner, staring back at me. And even more, he was putting something inside me!

Then it was back to darkness. But that struck me not. 

“Once something is in you, he has to open you to get it back,” the other drawers had always said. 

Instead, I turned my attention to my new vessel. It was small, and black. 

“Are you an eraser?” I asked it. 

“Why would somebody hide an eraser in the bathroom?” it responded tersely. Its voice was like when a drawer gets really rusty and begins to creak. It also smelled like a mixture of the apple and mint deodorants my owner had stashed in different drawers. I’d give you a more accurate description but again, I am only a drawer. 

I did not like its tone. It was in ME after all. I asked who it was. 

“Melvin,” it replied. 

“No, I meant like what is your purpose?”

“Spread positivity,” Melvin replied. 

“Oh,” I said, “that’s actually really nobl–”

“No, you dolt” Melvin said cutting me off, “I’m a box-mod. A vape.”

“Ohhh, I get it,” I replied. I did not get it. 

Melvin did not deign to respond to me, and I will admit I was too afraid of asking any more questions. He had a blinking light attached to him though, so my insides were washed sporadically with an orange hue. 

Melvin didn’t last too long though. After a while my owner came back to get him. 

“Goodbye Melvin” I called after him. 

“Don’t worry,” he said, “I’ll be back.” 

He never came back. 

But another Melvin came and stayed with me. Then he left and was replaced by another. More and more came and more and more left. Their visits began to speed up too. Sometimes Melvin wouldn’t even be named Melvin. It was all very confusing, I tried not to think about it too much. 

Instead, I focused on the brief periods of absolute joy when a wisp of the phosphorescent light beamed down into a sliver of my open drawer. Sure, it wasn’t much, but it held me over till I could get my next fill. I began to crave my next opening with hunger. I couldn’t think of anything else but getting a whiff of fresh air. 

Then one day, instead of getting another Melvin, Owner dropped something completely different in. I will be honest I did not notice. I was doing the drawer equivalent of barking like a mad dog in heat.  

But a while after I was closed, I noticed the new object. Or rather I noticed the new smell. Let me tell you, I did not like it. I would tell you I did the drawer equivalent of vomiting, but I think we’re both getting tired of the drawer equivalent jokes. Just trust me when I say it was revolting. 

After I mustered my courage, I asked this new object what it was. To my surprise, it was actually quite nice. 

“Terry Crews,” it said, “No relation.”

“To what?” I asked, again, I am a bathroom drawer. 

“Never mind,” Terry Crews said, seeming a bit miffed that I hadn’t understood it, “I’m weed, man, Frank probably hid me in here so his mom doesn’t find me and freak out.”

I did not understand about half the words in that sentence. 

“I did not understand half the words in that sentence,” I said. 

“Words are tricky,” Terry replied, nodding sagely. 

“Indubitably” I said. I didn’t know what that word meant either.

Our conversation lapsed, but the stench continued to simmer. I decided I did not care for Terry Crews and his fancy words. I wanted him gone. 

And after a while, he was. But then another Terry Crews came, and another. Sometimes Melvin’s would come along with them too, Once, a guy named Christopherson came. He said he was beer. He said he didn’t understand why he was in the bathroom. Then he was gone. It was very muggy when he was taken out. I think I heard the shower going, but I am not sure; I don’t have ears after all. 

Then one day I was opened and somebody’s hand groped around in me. It wasn’t the owner’s. Melvin and Terry crews were both taken away. They screamed when it happened. Said they were too young to be trash. I don’t know what that means. It scared me anyways. 

People stopped putting things in me after that. I was scared I’d be trapped in the darkness again, but every so often the foreign hand opens me up and fumbles around inside. I think it is searching for something. Or maybe for nothing. I don’t know, I’m just a drawer who can’t even open all the way. 

It used to open me all the time, but slowly it began to check less and less. And then eventually it stopped completely. After a while, the other drawers realized none of them had been opened in a long long time. They were all very scared. I had to comfort them; it was a whole scene. 

None of the drawers are opened very much at all now. But sometimes, every once and a while, the strange hand opens ME and searches around. Sometimes I think it’s looking for Terry Crews and Melvin. I don’t know why; Melvin was an asshole and Terry Crews smelled like shit, but I guess Owner liked them so who knows?

Maybe she misses the owner like the other drawers. Sometimes, I can almost feel the sadness in the way the hand gropes around in me. 

Almost, as I may have pointed out before, I am a drawer.