Photographs

In almost all my childhood memories I'm alone, only watched by someone from a comfortable distance. My father across the fields around our summer house, mother on the other end of the living room in Los Angeles, her mind lost somewhere in the latest issues of Vogue or W. Carl through a blurry haze of spoiled brats in the sun-drenched school yard.

Stephanie is at the Carlyle, the last time I heard Chloe's naked footsteps on the stone was before Nice. Traces of mother are everywhere - her lipstick marks on the bottles in the liquor cabinet, her dresses and jackets in the closets, a handwritten illegible note on the kitchen table - but her heartbeats are somewhere else.

When I close my eyes in the morning I can see myself amidst the flowers, the grass and the butterflies, by the fences and on the floors. I'm alone but someone is always watching me, waiting to break the silence and the peace.