I’m Sick And Tired Of Always Being A Good Girl

Stepping out of the shower, I walk towards the mirror and stand with a plaguing sense of insecurity.

I look at the gnawing stretch marks that engulf my breasts, thighs and hips, the very parts that are supposedly the chief characteristics of a woman’s sexual appeal.

I don’t bother looking at the curve of my waist or the mole on my back; I don’t flip my hair or slide my hand over the smooth expanse of my skin.

Why?

Because I haven’t had the courage to look at myself and say that I am good enough. I haven’t had the guts to tell myself that I am pretty and that I deserve the world. 

Instead, I put on the bathrobe and go straight to bed.

In nights such as this, I catch myself wondering if I am desired; not the mushy kind that warms your heart but the kind that sends your hormones in a blistering rage.

Am I allowed to fantasize having my hands pinned against the wall and him clutching my waist forward? Am I allowed to desire a man on top of me?

Am I allowed to let my imagination run wild, to places that I have never been. Or is this too a freedom not allowed to a woman?

Tonight, I feel like letting the good girl mask fall off; the mask that I have held on to so dearly, as if my life was depending on it. And, why won’t I put on a mask like this?

All my life, I have been asked to be a good girl; weep under the blanket cover but make everybody laugh, look pretty enough to garner attention but be blissfully unaware of the same, willingly submit to a man’s sexual needs but never speak of your own carnal desire, have an opinion but only if it resonates with the rest.

But tonight, I feel like disobeying all the rules, the ones that have always held me down and asked me to live a life only in accordance to the people around you.

I have to allow myself to feel beautiful, without needing a man to validate me for the same. I have to allow myself to kiss the lips that promise me the poison of desire. I have to let myself go, only to find myself again.

And to do so, I have to make mistakes.

Let me make mistakes tonight, the cruel ones that fill me with guilt and the innocent ones that makes no sense the next day.

Let me feel beautiful, despite the presence of cellulite and stretch marks that take so much of space; the kind of beauty that the glamour world disowns.

Let me get so drunk in passion that it numbs all the pain I feel. A puff of cigarette or a shot of whiskey down my throat will perhaps tarnish the image I so carefully protected, but that doesn’t bother me anymore.

I spring out of my bed and put on a lace gown; I sneak out the house because the night is still young and there are many mistakes to make.

Don’t you stop me tonight, for tonight I am not the good girl I have always been.