Drifting away slowly with your face stuck in my head…


Walking leisurely. The street is familiar, and you are there. The same street we walked all those months ago in the scorching summer heat…now the world is tinted gray. The street is empty; it’s just us. You smile, put an arm around me, I ask for nothing more, as I want nothing more…then a disapproving face appears before us. We don’t know her that well, I don’t care what she thinks, but you still remove your arm…

Flickering lights, sounds, people, places, things…we’re on your couch, tangled comfortably, the TV flashing images of war and peace, love and hate, fear and confidence. Your brother, my brother, your sister, my sister, our friends…all there, all staring at the TV, not seeing us. But you get up and move away, and I’m left alone on the couch…a few of them move to join me, but they fall away through holes opening in the floor before they reach me. Soon no one can reach me, for the gap between them and the couch is too great…and then it swallows me, too, and I’m descending with agonizing slowness through nearly tangible blackness, crying out, screaming your name, all alone…

It’s still dark, but there’s music blaring, loud, strange, but thrumming to the beat of my heart. Lights come on, dark lights, outlining shapes and shadows of people I don’t know and can barely see…but then a spotlight shines and I see you, dancing with a group of girls I’ve never seen in my life. Then you see me and you reach out your arm and tell me to come closer, and I do come, because I love dancing with you, it’s so much fun, and the other girls fade away into the dark crowd and it’s just you and me…but when I try to press my body close you yours, you’re not really there, you’re just a picture, and I fall right through you…

I blink, and when I open my eyes we’re in the movie theater, me, you, and two other hims I don’t care about very much. I’m between you and one of them. You turn to talk to the other one; the one on my left snakes an arm around me and begins kissing my neck. I know it’s him, but it feels like you, feels like your hand on the bare skin revealed near my waist and your lips on my throat. I can’t tell him to stop, you’re the only one I want to touch me like that, but he feels so much like you I can barely tell the difference…until he gets up and leaves, and you turn to me with a concerned and baffled expression as if asking, What’s wrong? And there’s so much wrong with this picture but I can’t describe it because the words are stuck in my throat where a lump has formed, and I want to cry but the tears won’t flow, they’re hiding from you…suddenly, you reach over and spread a palm on my upper back, move to kiss me, lower your mouth to my chest and kiss near my sternum, between my nearly nonexistent breasts. Then you turn away again, and I look down in shock and see a bruise, a bruise right where my heart is…

Back on your couch, just us, but you look like you don’t want to be there. I close my eyes, block out the image…

I wake up, in my bed, my room, Orlando Bloom gazing seductively at me from the opposite wall. I breathe slowly, feeling safe but unsafe, and I look around nervously, and there’s a strange boy in my room, he’s calling me, telling me to come with him, because everything will be fine with him, it will be fun…he’s handsome, seems nice enough. I follow him wordlessly, though I’m bursting with questions, down the hall, down the stairs, to the door, ready to leave. He turns to look at me, and I see your eyes…

Out the door by myself, walking the friendly, quiet streets. The sky is red, glowing faintly, with threads of purple and puffs of orange scudding pointlessly across it…I pass a group of boys, and they’re laughing and pointing at me. I look down, and nearly stumble in shock: I’m naked, and the bruise you left has grown larger, beautiful swirls of black, blue, and purple that ache continuously, even though they paint the tender, swollen flesh so delicately. It’s hard to imagine pain comes with such beauty…

The streets are no longer familiar; but that can’t be, I know this town like the back of my hand. But the buildings are strange, many tipping over, many falling apart, and a few standing straight and tall, shiny and new, their pride seeping through all the other buildings and eating away at them. I find your house, somehow, exactly how I last saw it, out of place amongst the decaying city…open the door, your brother’s in the kitchen, asks what I’m doing, and I don’t know what to tell him. I was lost, and I found your house, so I came inside…He says whatever and turns away, vanishing into the background…I run to the living room and you’re on the couch watching TV. Tears in my eyes again, still hiding from you but I know they’re there, I curl up into a ball and your arms are around me and you’re kissing my cheek and telling me it will be okay, and I want to believe you so badly, but we look out the window and a giant meteor is hurtling toward us. Oh well, at least I’ll die in your arms…squeeze my eyes shut, wait for the end…

Open my eyes, still in your house, still in your arms, but there’s no meteor, no messed up city. We’re all alone now, and you bend down and begin to kiss me, and I feel like I’ll melt, your lips soft but firm, and oh so persuasive…I’ll do anything you want, anything if you’ll just stay with me, because I can’t bear to be alone, I can’t handle being alone, I hate the emptiness that fills me up inside whenever you leave and don’t look back and don’t promise you’ll come back…shirts off, your hands all over me, your mouth conquering me, I can hardly breathe, I’m happy but it still feels wrong, you don’t love me, and I don’t love you, you love her, and I have no one to love, and no one to love me…

Running, screaming, crying, can’t see, sand between my toes, waves crashing, seagulls, rats with wings, calling high above, hair flowing, clothes rippling, I hear you behind me but I can’t stop running because I’m afraid, so afraid of what will happen when it all changes, when you move on like I know you will, and I’m stuck here in the past where I was happy once…but the past doesn’t make me happy anymore, it makes me nostalgic, and I hate it, I hate it, I just want it all to stop. I need to get away, but I’m slowing down because I really don’t want to leave you, you’re the only one I can’t stand to leave forever, what will I do without you?

But I turn around and she’s with you, the girl I’ve never met, the one you love, the one stealing you away from me, and your arm is around her now, and the tears finally broke free because they’re angry with you now, how could you do it? How could you betray me? You promised you’d never leave, you promised, you promised me. How can you break your promise like this and leave me all alone? I never asked for more than just to be there for me, I don’t need your romantic love, I just need your best friend love, that’s all I want, is that too much? And your hugs and your snuggles, they comfort me, remind me that there’s still hope for me to find this somewhere else…if it exists here, than it can exist elsewhere, too, but I need to find it, and I can’t find it, so for now I need you…I need you…


I stand here in the soft stand, before the wild surf, crying my eyes out, blood from my breaking heart trickling away with my tears, and yet you walk away with her.