Identity

M. J. Hamada

October 2005

You awake feeling different. On your back, lying atop the bed sheets, you stare at the shadows animating the ceiling, then at the large sun-illuminated window on the opposite wall, its light heating your body, which you next examine, amazed at what you find: this is not your body. Rising to your elbows, you cup, gingerly, with hands that are not your hands, the breasts that were not here last night, except in your dreams, perhaps. Yet you do not consider your dreams or the fact that you may have dreamt someone else's dreams: you are too fascinated by the breasts. They are large and round, like boxing gloves. Boxing gloves? That's ridiculous, you think. Even your mind is changing, has changed. You recall your father once saying, "When you walk, talk, eat, piss and think like a girl, you are a girl," but now you wonder whose father had actually spoken those words, whose memories you are recalling. No, your breasts are not boxing gloves; they are desert sand dunes, moonlight playing over them. On one breast, you run a finger across the pink flesh of the areola; it dimples at your touch. You squeeze the nipple–your brain being pricked by a thousand needles, your thighs tingling from a growing heat–and feel sensations untapped since you were pushed from the womb and into this world of overwhelming stimuli. You spread your legs and move your hands downward.

M.J. Hamada, known by friends and family as Momo, grew up in California and enjoys visiting bars and coffee houses throughout the state. He has friends named Goober, Frogg, and Sasquatch. He enjoys grunion-hunting, Bush-bashing, and spelunking. He is currently working on a book of short stories entitled Devil & Moan.

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