So I got invited to an art show. Not as a guest, not as someone who politely nods and pretends to understand why a pile of bricks is called Memory, but as part of it, which is a very different energy and one I should have interrogated more thoroughly before agreeing. It was one of those immersive, multimedia, feminist deconstructions of late-stage emotional capitalism, the kind where the press release is longer than the work itself and every sentence contains at least one hyphen and a promise of discomfort. You know the type. Everyone drinks wine out of jars because glasses are apparently complicit in something, nobody wears a bra but everyone keeps adjusting their clothes like they’re daring you to notice, and you’re expected to talk about intention even if all you did was smear paint on a cucumber and call it My Father. I had submitted something on a dare, which in hindsight explains everything. A photo series titled Things He Left Inside Me. It was supposed to be symbolic. Abstract. Conceptual. Possibly illegal in Utah. It was not, at any point, meant to involve me standing under lights while strangers evaluated my emotional organs like produce. But the gallery director loved it. Absolutely loved it. He said it was “brave,” which is a word that in art contexts means “you will regret this later.” He said it “juxtaposed erotic memory with archival trauma,” which I nodded along to even though I had not consciously juxtaposed anything and had mostly just been angry and very tired. Then he said—and this is where the night officially went off the rails—that I should present a live performance piece to go with it. Something embodied. Something present. Something that “activated the space.” Naturally, I said yes. Because I am a woman of vision. And also pettiness.

Opening night arrives like a dare that grew legs. Everyone is there. Julian’s ex is there, which I know because she once told me, unprompted, that she doesn’t believe in monogamy but does believe in closure, and then asked me if I was “healing or spiraling.” My ex’s ex is there, which feels redundant but somehow threatening. A guy who once tried to pitch me a podcast called Woke Bros is there, hovering near the kombucha tap like a bad idea waiting for funding. There is kombucha on tap, obviously, and someone is crying in the bathroom about how capitalism stole her orgasm, which people are responding to very earnestly, because this is a safe space and also a loud one. The vibe is immaculate. Unhinged, but immaculate. I take the stage. Or rather, the corner that has been designated as the stage by the strategic absence of chairs. I’m dressed in red, because if I’m going to combust socially I want it to be on theme. I’m holding a cordless mic that is slightly too warm, like it’s already nervous. I look out at the room and I can feel myself being perceived in layers, which is my least favorite way to exist, and yet I am radiating something like confidence, or possibly resignation. I look like vengeance in heels. I look like I planned this, which is the most dangerous illusion of all. I raise the mic. The room quiets. Someone coughs meaningfully. And I begin—

The lights dim, which is how you know something is about to be taken far too seriously, and I step forward into the circle of projections like I’m both the artist and the cautionary tale, like I volunteered for this and was also subpoenaed. Behind me the footage starts looping, because of course it does—me eating strawberries in exaggerated close-up, red juice on my fingers like evidence; me crying in IKEA, sitting on the floor between flat-packed optimism and a lamp named after a Swedish lake; me unzipping a hoodie in slow motion, not sexy so much as deeply committed to the idea of vulnerability. It’s all very intimate, very curated, very please look at me while I pretend I don’t care, and the soundtrack swells at exactly the wrong moment, because it’s a mashup—moaning cut with voicemail, desire spliced with admin, all of it coming from him. Julian. His voice floats through the room, earnest and haunted, explaining how he’s never felt this way before, how this is different, how he can’t wait to be vulnerable with me again once Mercury’s out of retrograde, as if the planets personally conspired to make him emotionally unavailable. I clear my throat, because timing matters, and begin the monologue like it’s a ritual and a roast at the same time. “This body,” I say, gesturing broadly, generously, “is not a storage unit for your fragile ego.” A pause. Let it land. Always let it land. “This bed is not a community center for your spiritual rebirth.” I snap my fingers because it feels right—and there are murmurs of appreciation, the kind that say yes, this is art, even though half of them are just relieved it’s not happening to them. Then I lift the prop, because every good performance needs an object to focus the projection, and yes, it’s a literal strap-on, painted gold, gleaming under the lights like a relic stolen from a very specific museum gift shop. I hold it up reverently and tell them its name is “Closure,” because symbolism should never be subtle when you’re angry. The audience reacts exactly the way audiences are trained to react—someone gasps, someone laughs too loudly, someone weeps directly into a charcuterie board like cured meats can absorb secondhand trauma—and I continue, pacing now, warmed up, calibrated. “You said my orgasms were performative,” I say, sweetly, conversationally, “but baby, so was your masculinity.” Boom. That’s the line. That’s the one they’ll quote later. I drop the mic, because you’re supposed to, even if it’s metaphorical, and I pick up the Polaroid—yes, that one, the infamous penis from earlier, the one that arrived uninvited and stayed too long—and I set it gently on fire in a ceramic bowl labeled “Feedback,” because nothing says growth like labeled containers. The flame flickers, the image curls, and for a moment everything feels exquisitely controlled. It’s art. It’s catharsis. It’s revenge with lighting cues. And somewhere, far outside this perfectly staged circle, I am certain my mother’s aura is flickering violently, like a smoke alarm reacting to a kind of heat it was never designed to detect.

I finish the piece. I actually finish it. I stand there at the edge of the space, lights still warm on my skin, body humming like I’ve just stepped out of a minor electrical fire, and I do what you’re supposed to do when you’ve just detonated something deeply personal in front of strangers: I strike a pose and wait for the consequences. Arms folded. Chin up. One eyebrow already halfway raised in anticipation of judgment. I’m braced for scandal, for shock, for that very specific kind of silence where you can practically hear someone reaching for a pen to write “problematic” on a Post-it and slap it directly onto my forehead like a public service announcement. I expect discomfort. I expect regret. I expect to be politely escorted out of the room by someone in black. Instead—applause. Actual applause. Not the confused kind. Not the polite academic clapping that sounds like damp laundry. No, this is real, enthusiastic, hands-above-shoulder applause, with whooping, with someone making an involuntary noise that might technically count as joy. A woman in a turtleneck starts crying, full tears, like I’ve just unlocked something inside her she didn’t know was behind glass. A man in suspenders raises his hand and asks if the burning penis photo was a metaphor for late-stage performative intimacy, and I say yes, immediately, confidently, because that sounds infinitely smarter than “he was a dick and I was mad,” which is the truth but lacks funding potential. People nod. Someone writes something down. I feel myself getting taller. Then a person from a zine I’ve definitely pretended not to care about approaches me with the reverence usually reserved for saints and says, “This reminds me of early Marina Abramović, but with more lube.” I say thank you, because what else do you say to that. Another girl hugs me — full contact, no warning — and whispers into my ear that I’ve just helped her break up with her DJ, which feels like community service. Someone starts chanting “Slay queen,” completely unironically, and I let it happen because I’ve earned at least one unearned moment in my life. And Julian? Julian isn’t there. But his new girlfriend is. She approaches me calmly, like a diplomat crossing hostile territory, puts a hand on my arm — solid, grounding, almost tender — and tells me that what I did was brave. She pauses, just long enough to make it count, and then adds, almost casually, “He still cries during sex, by the way.” I look at her, really look at her, and say, “So do I. But mine is performance.” We both nod, like this explains everything, and then we clink kombucha glasses like war survivors who have decided not to compare scars. And standing there, sticky with sincerity and oat-based beverages, something shifts. For the first time in ages, I’m not replaying what I should have done differently, or what this says about me, or how this will look later in retrospect. I’m just there, in the aftermath, upright and untouchable, feeling like I didn’t just survive something — I conquered it. For the first time in a very long time… I feel legendary.

The show ends. The gallery clears in slow, syrupy waves, the kind that leave behind fingerprints and half-drunk glasses and the faint, tragic scent of dairy-free brie that has been handled by too many sincere people. Everyone is sticky with feelings, lactose alternatives, and the unearned confidence that comes from standing near art long enough to believe it might rub off. I drift through the aftermath like a holy ghost in fishnets, lightly buzzed, lightly glowing, carried forward on fumes and validation and whatever vaguely herbal, wildly overpriced thing I’m sipping because someone pressed it into my hand and said, “You have to try this.” People approach me with shining eyes and that particular trauma-bonding energy that suggests they have not only seen themselves in my work, but would like to move in temporarily and unpack. They tell me I’m brave. They tell me I’m radical. They say things like “reclaiming the discourse” with the kind of reverence usually reserved for saints or exes who’ve gone no-contact. One guy with a mustache and visible commitment issues leans in close, nodding as if we are co-conspirators in something important, and tells me my work is “so post-patriarchal.” I ask him, genuinely curious, if that means he’s going to start doing foreplay. He does not answer. He blinks, retreats, and I mark that as a win. At the afterparty, something happens to the air around me. I become, somehow, a minor celebrity. Not famous-famous, but dangerous-famous, the kind where people think they know you because they’ve decided what you represent. Someone suggests naming a cocktail after me, like this is a normal thing that happens to people who were eating instant noodles three days ago. I suggest “The Closure Shot.” Half mezcal, half tears of your ex. Served flaming, obviously. No one questions this. I take selfies with strangers who call me “aesthetic” as if it’s a medical diagnosis. I get asked to appear on three podcasts, one of which is called Hot Sad Girls Making Moves, and I accept immediately, because I am nothing if not on brand. At some point, a woman I have never met before asks me to sign her boob with a gold Sharpie. I do. She looks at me, deadly serious, and says, “You’re my Roman Empire.” I tell her not to get conquered too fast. We both laugh like this makes sense, like history is a joke we’re in on, and for a moment I believe it. And for a few shining hours, suspended somewhere between glitter and delusion, I don’t feel broken. I don’t feel humiliated. I don’t even feel like I need therapy, which is how I know this is temporary. I feel like Beyoncé and Judith Butler had a baby and raised it in a sex-positive haunted house, the kind with excellent lighting and emotional honesty and just enough ghosts to keep things interesting. I feel powerful in a way that is probably unsafe but deeply enjoyable, like I might accidentally start a cult if someone gives me a microphone and a deadline. Will it last? Of course not. But tonight—Tonight I’m untouchable. And maybe slightly overexposed.