Because what else would I do? There is nothing I'm more suited for. The words fight to be freed from my mind, strain at the tips of my fingers for want of a representation on paper. I have composed my life, continuously. Thoughts, feelings, ideas -- all recorded and edited and written in my head. The lives of those around me no safer from the frantic author that is myself. I write them down too. Sometimes real paper, sometimes the air around them, for them to read later, or simply for the preservation of truth as I see it. In the quiet, in the crowd, in the storm, in the sun, in the chaos...always a narration running. I see things in words, see moments in sentences, relationships in stories. Everyone a character and everything a plot. It's how I connect, it's how I live, it's how I breathe. What would I be if not this? What course would my life take it not this one? To set it aside for the pursuit of things more trivial or more honored would be to accept a lie. No silence, for fear it would last forever. The voice cannot be quited, the argument denied, the idea slain. They endure. In the post-it, in the letter, in the essay. In the dust on your car. It's not a choice, not a path taken. It's what I am, it's the vehicle by which I go the path. The rules and the confines of the accepted art, those I can learn -- those I can be taught. The perfection of them will come with time. Or it will not. But they hinder me not, they are but the surface of the truth which lies beneath. A decoration, a refinement. Secondary. To have them and nothing more is to have a flower, plastic and fabric. Beautiful to look at, but with no merit of its own, no way to create, no roots, no fragrance. The real flower, spotted with dirt, imperfect in appearance, so much more beautiful than its plastic counter part. Not severed from grace, not removed from passion -- but defined by its imperfections and by them colored with authenticity. What would I be if not this? Silent, mute, walking death. Through the craft grown and made alive. Through the encouragement and critic made strong. Confidence tempered with humility. Passion molded through perseverance and hard work. I become that which I do. I become that which I write. It writes me.

I got bruises on my knees when I knelt to pray on the cold floor. The redundant shaking of hands leaves my arm sore.
My fingers got burnt lighting candles of contrition. My eyes are tired from looking up for permission.
My throat is raw from confession. I have headaches from the smell of insense burned for guilty depression.
I turn the pages of the hymnal and they leave my hands bleeding. My chapped lips tremble with my prayers of pleading.
In the safety of the white building I found nothing but another lie. It seems as if this is where truth comes to die.
The book that will save me is heavy in my lap. The red words on the thin pages are starting to feel like a trap.

(unfinished)

Distant.

It’s strange to me, to think that I existed in past years. Maybe this is odd, or an indication that I should be in a mental ward. But when I look at things and see the date, I have a surreal moment. I look at the numbers, so simple and plain.
But they were years ago. In a time that exists now only in memory. How can I know it was real?
And those pictures, how do I know the face is mine? I remember, but how can I be certain? The face looks so distant, separated from myself. The date in the corner is like a different dimension. The things of that date blur and run together like melting ice cream. I can’t remember where one starts and the other ends. It scares me a little.
These moments are times in the past. Times gone. Dead. Distant. Lost.
What do I do with them? How do I reconcile them with the present? I am not sure.
Ten years ago, twelve years ago, nineteen…I don’t remember that person. I don’t know her. I wonder if she knows me. The things we could talk about if I met myself.
I think about all the years before my years. The stars in the sky. They have endured. They were there before I was born, and when I die, they will still be there. I will become dust in a coffin and they will continue to shine. It makes me feel small.
And it makes me feel young.
Time is a strange thing. Can't hold or touch it. Can't measure it or record it. It just is. And will be. And I'll forget and I'll remember. And the colors and images and people will run together. And time will know what happened.
And I might not.

I gave you too much credit. I decieved myself again.

I thought you might permit me a goodbye. An end. I wanted the music to play and the credits to roll. But you just cut the scene. Black screen. No sound.

But you forgot something.

You forgot about all the little pieces of yourself that you left behind. Take them with you. You should have left nothing.
No memories.

No reminders.

It should have been as if you never existed.

But it's not. Is it?

Now it's just a story unfinished. Forever suspended.

You know so well how it will eat at me. Devour me. A constant.

But after all the beatings, it's still ticking for you.
Always for you.

You hear me?

Always.

Portrait of Possibility

She is supposed to be reading her novel intently for the next forty-five minutes, but finds herself instead reading something else entirely. His desk is placed diagonally from hers in the stuffy classroom, allowing her a perfect profile of the fallen angel seated in front of her. His tragically beautiful face is composed of the eyes of a poet, the mouth of a rebel, the hands of a warrior; green-blue eyes with a slight gray hue to them like a puddle on the street. In these eyes there is a constant bitterness and a loneliness that causes her heart to throb. His shaggy brown hair falls across his eyes, held in place by a black hat; always the same hat. In looking at him now she can see who he is underneath his tough exterior, beneath the layers of disregard.
It must be tiring to carry the weight of his feigned indifference day after day; she can imagine the calluses it must wear upon his shoulders. He is sitting back in his chair now, relaxed yet on edge, with his eyes glued to a well-worn book. Fitzgerald, she guesses silently, maybe Salinger. He is dressed in black and white chucks, jeans adorned with rips and holes of his own creation and a tee shirt with a political message slashed boldly across his chest in bright red, she can’t tell if he made it or not. He has his black studded belt on as well, slung low on his hips, rendering his belt loops useless. She wants to remember the way he looks now; she wants to preserve it in her mind like a black and white photograph.
Gazing at him she sees a boy who’s running scared, but she also sees a man lurking beneath, a man who’s tired of running and of hiding. She sees all these things, layered upon top of each other. And while she sees things in him that she detests, they do not overshadow the things in him that she loves, the things that draw her in like a moth to the flame. The other things can be overlooked, for it is not the boy that holds her captive, but the man. All her words don’t do him justice, this man beneath. He’s thoughtful, loving, fascinating, and wild. A hero dressed in holey jeans and scuffed shoes. A wanderer flung amidst a cruel ocean of normalcy. She is captivated by the possibility bursting forth from him. He brims with potential; it spills from his strong arms and radiates from his graceful shoulders.
But what a foolish thing to lose her heart to: possibility.
It is of little importance, however, that he might never set his man beneath free. To her the existence of him is enough. He has become some kind of warped crusade, her personal mission, where points are allotted for trying. No one else cares to make the effort; no one else bothers to see him. He is classically misunderstood, or perhaps simply underappreciated. It’s not easy, she will admit that much. He excels in pushing people away and in building walls that a trained army would struggle with. It has worked for him thus far, this forced distance. However, she knows he is waiting for someone to push back. He is waiting for someone who isn’t afraid to challenge him. He is waiting for someone who will not believe him when he says he’s fine. He is waiting for someone to see through his weak façade. And she does.
Even now as he sits scrunched in his desk she can see the signs of insecurity peeking through. His posture is relatively relaxed, but his foot taps self-consciously against the floor. An untrained eye might mistake his crossed arms, with one hand holding the book casually, as confidence, but she knows that his arms are crossed with uncertainty; a half-hearted attempt to hide. She notices the dark, purplish circles under his eyes from a late night, not of studying, but of frantic writing in an attempt to make sense of the thoughts pounding in his head.
His eyes flick up to meet hers, effectively shattering her flow of thoughts. He must have sensed her staring at him. He gives her a quick grin, with a playfully questioning look illuminating his eyes. She offers a knowing smile in return, enjoying their moment of camaraderie. It’s been too long since she last saw that grin and its appearance is more than welcome, even at the temporary death of her composure. His smiles always have that effect on her, a sudden stirring of her thoughts. It’s the kind of smile that inspires poets to write and artists to paint. His lips twisted in that way create a kind of enchantment to which she hopes never to become immune.
He turns his attention back to his book, leaving her to smile down into the pages of her own once more. It is these moments that make all the others worth it. The seconds where he drops his guard are worth the days that he refuses to do so. He is worth it, no matter the obstacles she is forced to endure endlessly. The sleepless nights fraught with worry over him are worth it. Any price he would require of her she would gladly pay, if only to have him smile once again. She would give up a mundane eternity to have only this moment, this one sliver of time, forever. But the lofty gods ignore her offer and the bell rings loudly in her ears, signaling the end of class, and of the moment. As she falls into stride with him she hopes silently that this time will not be the last.

Untitled, Unfinished

His white shirt was wrinkled and untucked, his tie loose around his neck. He had pushed his sleeves up around his elbows, revealing the subtly defined muscle of his forearm. Beneath his thin button down the ridges and planes of muscle could be seen along his back and shoulders. A strong frame, to carry a heavy burden.
A lock of blonde hair fell across his forehead and covered part of one eye- the consequence of repeatedly running his hand through his hair.

With his elbows touching his knees he sat, dejected, bent over on himself. It was cold outside now, nearly dusk, and the hard wooden bench on which he sat could offer him no warmth. But if the chill in the air bothered him, he made no indication. He just sat, unmoving. A perfect impression of a carved statue, beautiful and lifeless. The trees around him rustled their dry, golden leaves in the gentle breeze. All around him the earth was begining to lose its green, and was instead being replaced with dark reds, bold yellows, and rusty oranges. The clouds hung low in the darkening sky, with the strong rays of the sun surrendering slowly to the west.

The sound of my footsteps brought his face up suddenly to meet mine. Lines of tension creased his forehead and the darkened sockets of his face house two watery graves of green-brown. His eyes were like staring into the darkest depths of despair. Upon seeing me, a single line of moisture traced down one cheek of his unmoving face.

I gingerly sat down next to him, still staring into his face. No words could form in form in my mind, not that the lump in my throat would let them past anyway. Instead, I reached up with one hand, and gently brushed away the still-remaining tear with the back of my fingers. Something in him gave way, I saw it in his mouth. The hard, firm line of his lips, tightly shut before, cracked open just enough to reveal the tremble in his bottom lip. Before I could pull my hand back into lap he caught it with his own, holding it in place for a moment. With fingers like ice he pulled my hand and arm around his neck, while simultaneously leaning closer to me.

And then everything was a blur, rushing by in fastfoward.

His mouth was crushing to mine, with nothing short of fury. He wrapped his arms around me, drawing me into him even as I felt myself already pressing into his chest. My hands tangled in his hair, and locked around him, refusing to let go.

And then all the sudden he still. He face pushed back from mine, unreadable. The change was so abrupt that for a second I thought I had imagined the whole thing.

"I'm so sorry," he whispered, his voice strained. Still his hands remained in place.

"I didn't mean to overstep, I-" he started, but I didn't let him finish. Hadn't he apologized enough already? There was nothing here to weight his shoulders, no regret to darken his face. Even after everything, even now, he worried about being wrong in his emotions. About stepping over the lines he continued to break, even as he sought to avoid them.

I touched my lips back to his, silencing him and removing his lingering doubt. He resisted for half a second, and then he allowed the heat of the kiss to thaw out the ice of his worries. I had begun to wonder how anyone could fail to see the good in him; how they could miss his truest self, struggling daily to shine the haze of his past. But his intensity soon burned those thoughts away, and I was beyond the calm and rash state that allowed thought.

What tomorrow would bring, neither of us then knew. I knew his fight was far from over, in many ways it had just begun, but I did know one thing. I knew that when the demons came for him again, when the ghosts poured out of his closet once more, that he would not have to face them alone.

Conversations at the Corner of First

There he was. Plain jeans, a white button down. A little scruff on his jaw line, bags under his eyes.

He sure didn't look like a Savior.

Leaning against the street sign marking the corner of First and Amistad, hands in his pockets, face to the sky, he stood. Just waiting.

I wasn't sure what to say as I approached, but at the slight sound of my footsteps he looked over at me.

"It's been so long since I've seen you, my friend, " he said, eyes crinkling into a thousand-year-old smile.

"Yeah, you haven't been around much," I replied.

"I try not to impose on the lives of others. I never left you though." He gestured with his hands to the space around him, "You know where to find me, and I've been waiting for you for so long. I was beginning to wonder if you would ever return."

His eyes just stayed focused on mine. It was disconcerting. I shifted the bag in my hands awkwardly.

"Did you have something you wanted to ask me?" He smiled again.

"I want to know what you want. From me. From all of us. I came here to ask you what you want from me. And to tell you that I don't want to play this game anymore. I just want you to spell it out." I hadn't planned to say it like that, to just blurt it out. But it seemed odd to bother with small talk around Him.

The wind blew a piece of his shaggy hair and pulled at his loose shirt while he stood there, just looking at me.

Finally he spoke."I want to be your friend. You don't have to do anything, if you don't want to. You just have to let me be your friend, nothing else. You don't even have to do that if you don't want to."

"They call you a King, a Master. A master doesn't have friends, he has servants."

He sighed, looking tired."They do call me that, don't they? I suppose they have a hard time understanding me for what I am. But do you see a crown on my head? Do you see a whip in my hand?"

I shook my head.

"It's because I don't want those things. I give love, and it's hard for you to understand that I don't require anything in return. It would be nice if you loved me back, it would give me a joy like you can't comprehend, but it's not a requirement."

"They say you want worship, devotion, obedience." I spit out the last word with distain.

"They are wrong."

I must have looked confused, because he explained further.

“Some want to make me fit their vision of what a savior should be, what a god should be. They put me on a throne, ignore my love and create in its place cruelty and jealousy. But they're wrong. Their intentions may be pure, perhaps, but they've taken my words and twisted them. They've made me something they can understand. They don't understand love

"If you want love, then why did you create a world so full of hate and despair?"

"I valued your freedom above all else. I would not have you be puppets at my hand. I gave you life, and a free will, and the freedom to do what you chose. Sometimes you choose to spread hurt and anger. You chose violence at times. Remember, I said I don't like to impose. I'm not a super hero waiting to save the day. I can't give you your freedom and then take it away to save you from yourselves. You are free to succeed and free to fail. Love loses its meaning when it’s conveyed through the bars of a cage."

"What if I don't buy it? What if I don't believe it?"

"What is there to buy? Nothing here is for sale. It's free."

He smiled.

"Your disbelief in me does not sway my belief in you. So you could do nothing, believe nothing, and it wouldn't change a thing."

"Then what's the point? If I could just carry along with my life like I never met you and still get the prize, then what's the point?"

He ran his hand across his jaw, like he was trying to come up with just the right words.

"Have you ever loved someone

Yes."

"If they had told you that they did not love you, if they rejected you, would that change how you felt about them? Would that weaken your love for them at all?"

I thought about it for a moment.


“Maybe. If they don’t want me then what’s the point it hanging around? Can’t force someone to accept you if they don’t want it.”

“I asked would you still love them. Not what you would to about it. If you truly loved them, could anything they do erase that love?

"No. It's not something you can make go away."

“That person that you love, if they fell down, would you help them up?”

“Of course. I’d do anything for them.”

His eyes wrinkled into a smile.

"Exactly.”

We stood in silence for a few moments. Him with his eyes shut, breeze on his face, me staring out at nothing.

He spoke first."That bag looks heavy; would you like me to carry if for you?"

“Why? I can get it; it’s not a big deal.”

“I can see the blisters on your shoulders from here.”

I hadn't noticed it before, but the bag was starting to dig into my shoulders. It was actually quite painful. I’d been carrying it for a while.

He spoke again, “I’ll carry it for you, just hand it to me. I’ll carry it wherever you want to go. You’re free to take it back at any point.”

"Yeah ok, here. You can take it if you really want to.”

"I would like nothing more."

It's early morning, the time of day where dew still cleans to the grass, barely visible in the pale sunlight. My shoes squeak as I walk quietly through the graveyard, trying not to disturb the utter silence that envelopes me. The earth is still sleepy and moon has not yet relinquished its place in the sky, but the grave markers are clearly visible. They solid rock and stone shines with a light all its own, strong and timeless.

I come here to look at the names. I let my hands brush ever so slightly on the tops of the headstones as I walk past them, one by one. They are old, so very old, yet untainted by the ravages of time. Sure they're a little worn down by ages of rain and endless winds, but nothing could damper their splendor. They serve as reminders of what was, what is and what will yet become.

Some are big, carved into intricate shapes. On them are names written in bold script, sunken deep into the stone. Names of people I never knew. Dates that are vivid to someone, somewhere, but that mean little to me.

I am just an observer.

I like to imagine the people whose names I read. I imagine what they would have looked like, what kind of life they might have lived. The Martha's and Arleen's live quiet lives in my mind, peaceful. The James' and Violets live grand lives as secret kings and lost adventures. They have people who love them, they have families. Other times they are solitary. Each name brings about a new scenario to mind.

One name inspires a tragic tale of love. I can picture the grieving woman leaning her hands against the cold, wet stone in front of me. Tears fall from her face, and fresh flowers hang limply in her hand. She falls to her knees, and gently places the flowers at the base of the rounded marker. She brushes her fingers against the name, the date, the one line of explanation. She stands, and looks behind at me, then vanishes. Sometimes I wonder if what I'm seeing is entirely fictional.

Some graves have flowers, or flags. Others are covered with moss and look as though they have not been touched in far too long. Forgotten, perhaps like the decaying bodies they house. Time carries on, claiming one life after another, filling its soil with their spent shells.

But even as decades come and go, cemeteries endure. People constantly feel the need to mark the losses of each other. A reminder left for anyone, really. One page, cement diaries. Sure family and friend visit, but the headstones seem to me like a testament to lives when those who remember them are gone. They stand, crooked and immovable, telling whoever wanders in here that this name is worth something, it's worth remembering.

It makes me wonder why people come to these places. A poem springs to mind; "Do not stand at my grave and weep/I am not there/I do not sleep". There is nothing here of the person known in life, yet we come here and talk to them, cry to them.

There is nothing here but bones and bits of flesh in decorated boxes covered by the dirt.

Yet here I stand. Alone in a cemetery, imagining the lives of those who live no more. Perhaps that's what cemeteries are for. To allow you to live on the minds of the fanciful wandering. Maybe their a chance to escape the bonds of monotony that enslaved you in life.

Tessa.

Her name is Tessa. She comes every Tuesday morning, I am told, at precisly five past eight. Armed with a roll of trash bags and a can of red bull she begins her routine. She was sick last week, and since I hadn't started work until last week, I am meeting her for the first time.

Her enthusiasm arrives before she does in the form of a off-key version of "Love Song". A bright, yet aged, face bursts through the door in a current of energy. She's dressed in stained khaki shorts and too short tan shirt. Compared to my own black pants and button down shirt, she doesn't look very proffessional, but there is something about her that speaks of authority.

"Good morning ladies. Oh!" She paused, focusing her eyes in on me. They softened instantly.

"You must be the new one. Well aren't you just adorable. Look at your hair- I love it! Good God honey, you look bored. It's this place, it will bore you to tears. Sometimes I think I might just drop dead from it all. But that's why I don't work at a desk, no way. Can't focus on nothing for that long. Got to keep moving. You're working in a good place though, better than the others. These ladies here are fabulous." She paused only to throw a smile towards my two coworkers.

"I tell you what, this place is filthy. You'd think the college could spring the few bucks to have me come in here more than once a week. Ain't you ladies' fault of course. You don't say much, do you?" She paused again, grinning down at me where I sat in my chair. She smelled of menthol cough drops and cheap perfume.

To be honest, I wasn't sure how to respond. I wasn't uncomfortable, if it was even possible to be around her; she way she spoke made me feel like we'd been friends for years. I smiled up at her, the only reaction I could muster at the moment. She beamed in response, her face crinkling around her ancient, knowing eyes.

As she set to work emptying the various trash cans located around the small room, she chatted with the other two. They talked of children and grandchildren, and of husbands, but I noticed that Tessa mentioned none of her own. They exchanged bits of gossip about other employees on the campus, and traded comments on the condition of the world in general. I caught Tessa's mention of rising healthcare costs, followed by the subtle admittence that her sickness last week was due to the end of her remission from cancer.

"They tell me I need to see the doctor three times a week, as if I have time for that. Hell, as if I have money for that. I've had to take up a second job just to feed my energy drink habit, which they want me to kick by the way. I'm not about to do that," she chuckled. "You I got hooked because of those coupons. I told you about that didn't I?" She didn't wait for a response. "I sent in a cartoon to Reader's Digest, a picture of a little guy drinking the stuff. You know, I'm an artist, when I get the free time. Course, I couldn't go to college for it or nothin', life's funny that way. But anyway, I won the contest, and they send me a thousand dollars in free coupons. I got hooked on the damn stuff, excuse my language, and now here I am, drinking it even though I've used up the coupons!" The ladies laughed along with her, though Christine made a subtle comment about engergy drinks not being healthy. If Tessa heard her she chose not to respond.

Before long she had finished the trash cans, and was now starting on the vaccuming. The vaccum tank was strapped to her back, with the wand and cord wrapping around her. She looked odd, standing there in her shorts and ill-fitting beige shirt. Her black headband gave her a youthful appearence, espcially paired with her tennis shoes. She looked almost like child pretending to be a super hero.

She hummed as she worked, sometimes full out singing. Her songs had no particular order, and covered everything from folk songs to current pop music. I enjoyed listening to her.

"Excuse me dear," she said, swiping the vaccum under my desk and feet. I scooted out of her way, feeling oddly useless.

Sooner than I would have thought, Tessa was finished with vaccuming. The clock above my head read 8:25.

"Well lovelies, I have to get moving. Got another doctor's appointment today. They want to poke some more needles in me or something. God only knows what. I have to be there at 8:45. What time is it now?" She looked over at Christine for an answer.

"8:26. Is it here in town?" Christine asked in response.

Tessa laughed.

"God no. Wouldn't that be nice if it was. It's in the city. I have to meet a friend of mine, she's giving me a ride. Aint't that far from here though, is it? I still have another room to do. Time off doesn't come easily around here." Tessa wrinkled her nose as if she smelled something bad. Branshing her energy drink and monster of a vaccum she headed for the door.

"You all have a nice day, don't work too hard. Especially you Honey," she said looking at me. "I'm off to grand adventures. See you all next week!" She called behind her cheerfully.

Christine turned to Rebecca, the other of the three employees including myself. "My, she is strange as ever. Nice enough though." Rebecca nodded in solid agreement, then turned to me.

"Now, don't you get me wrong, because she's a hard worker and all, but we've got to watch her. She's real nice, but she's one of the cleaning crew, you get what I mean? She's a sweet lady, but you know. I just don't want you getting the wrong idea."

I just looked at her, my eyes giving away nothing.

"No. I don't know what you mean." I said.

She ruffled her shirt a bit before answering.

"Well nevermind, I was just saying is all. Nevermind. It's not important."

(unfinished)

Lining the Wire

Five...eight...eleven. I count the number of birds in my head. They line the thin wire above me, perched in perfect stillness. Do they talk to each other while they're up there? I wonder. Perhaps they hold secret meetings, conducted high above the listening ears of others. I doubt it. They don't seem to be paying too much attention to each other.

I study their tiny frames. So light they must be, to keep their balance up there. Do they ever fall? I suppose when you have wings to catch you it doesn't matter.

They look so somber, with their beaks pointed straight ahead, claws tightly clutched. Perhaps these wires are a common resting point. These feathered friends could have come from anywhere, yet they all come here to give their small lungs a break. It's like an airport for birds, I think.

Looking at them up there, all in a line, a thought strikes me. Where do they go from here? When they finally take the tiny leap from the wire where do they go? Do they stay in town or do they head for another town, another state? The potential they have. No baggage claim to slow them down or ticket prices to delay their trip. They come and they go. Any time of day, any day of the week.

To be a bird.

But would I embrace that freedom if it were suddenly granted to me? Or would I hesitate forever on the wire, stuck tight with the overwhelming possibility? Would I stay forever at the mid point, listening to the stories of others, never making my own? These birds, they must be terribly brave. With a life so short they don't linger long. A few minutes and they take off once more, in a direction all their own. They waste no time seeking out their journey.

Oh, to be as a bird.

Dance of the Damned

It's a dance and we both know the steps by heart. Forward and back. Back then forward.
Repeat.

You grab my cold, dead hands and pull me to my feet. In your eyes I see that familar flickering light, and I wrench my hands from yours and use them to push you out onto the dance floor. You plead and beg, hand outstrech. You know the dance, but can't manage it on your own. Find another partner, I say. But even as I look around the room I see that there are none.

Better judgement ignored I take my place in your hands. You're grip is tight, almost too tight. I ignore the fleeting pain as the music begins. It's slow at first, almost happy. It sounds of reunion, of forgivness.

It doesn't last.

Before I can pull away again, the music has us both captive with it's forceful rythm. Our feet move togather in the only way they know how. It's no longer happy, but a sad mournful tune. You knew it was coming, but you panic anyway. I can feel your heartbeat quicken through my own skin. You try to slip from the embrace, but I sink my fingers into your shoulder and clasp them around your own fingers.

You're not going anywhere. The dance must be finished and it demands nothing less than blood.

My face is rigid and your eyes are tightly shut. I think you might sink into my embrace at long last, but instead you step on my feet and cause me to lose my balence. But the same arms that shove me away are there to pull me back up again. A deal is a deal.

Back and forth we go. Two steps here, and one there. Around the room we circle, and unending. We twirl faster and faster till the world outside the windows is nothing but a blur. Your hair falls into your eyes and you don't even notice. The floor beneath my my bare feet feels like ice. Cold, inforgiving, dangerous. We might fall.

But we've had too much pratice to fall, and so we continue on without flaw.

For days we continue, weak and tired the both of us. At long last song begins to draw to a close, the cycle begins to break. You stand in place, gasping for breath. I walk backward, slowly, on unsteady legs. I take one last look, then turn to leave. I swear that I am done. My feet are raw and bleeding, my back aches from holding you up. You don't look at me.

As I reach the door, I hear you let out a sob. I turn back.

There you lay on the floor, having collapsed under the weight of your own heart. The floor beneath you is smeared in blood, and I can't tell who's it is.

Help me, you whisper.

My blisters and bruises cry out as I begin to walk back toward you. A faint music plays softly in the background. I feel my own hot tears start to prick at the corner of my eyes. I blink them away.

You're a mess, I whisper, extending my shaking hand. You reach for it, but fall short. I want to tell you to stay there, to look at at my own scars, my own wounds. But I won't. I won't leave you there. I will not leave you like you would leave me.

I lower myself to the ground next you. I take your face in my hands and wipe away the tears. With all my strength I pull you to your feet. Your weight sags against me and my knees almost buckle, but I refuse to heed them.

The music has begun again, calling us both to our places.

We lost our simplicity. We lost it somewhere on the beach, in the parking lot, on the grass, in the cracks of the sidewalk, or in one of the sticky booths at the pizza place. We spent so much time making plans to do something great- something memorable. We failed to see then that those would become the strongest memories. Just the times we spent planning the rest of our lives.

It was simple then, because all the worries and fears were things to be dealt with in the future. We didn't have to worry about life in those moments, we just lived it. And we didn’t even notice. We look back now and that is what we remember. We remember laughter, smiles, jokes, tears, and secrets… all the things that brought us together for those seconds and minutes and years.

How many times did the sun go down on us before we realized that each time it did so it got closer to being the last time?

After School

The dream's gone out, like the lights in the wake of the janitor. The doors that once seemed so big now shrink before my frame. Mere weeds have now become trees, a canopy above me, blocking out the sky. Chains on the swings now squeak not with use, but with rust. The sun sinks behind me, it's glare spreading to the windows. Behind the streaked glass sit dusty books and paper houses, yellowed by the unending flow of days.

There is no rest for this place, it endures tirelessly, unwillingly. Cigarettes and condom wrappers litter the ground where once before there were juice boxes and failed tests. Shards of glass sprout up from the ground in places where violets and dandelions once grew. Laughter echoes in the approaching dusk, harsh and bitter. Before there were giggles that bounced between the wooden rungs of the monkey bars.

The air still holds the lingering smell of rubber and asphalt. The cement still shows the fading lines of four square and hopscotch. A thousand sneakers have flattened these paths, but I remember only my own. Shoelaces untied, hair twisted by the breeze. Strong winds blow now, as night quiets the secrets housed beneath the rocks and sticks. All that has come and gone, and has yet to be seems to take flight in the stubborn wind.

There is nothing here for me. Distant memories, ideas torn and shredded by reason. The future is no longer a grand adventure, but a haunting shadow ever upon my heels. My hands are stained with blood instead of paint, my face marred with ash instead of fresh dirt. I am no longer a creator, but a destroyer. My footprints are too big, my voice too loud in the quiet of this place. My mind is sealed shut against its lingering wisdom, my heart hardened against its last whispers. This is a sacred place, a hallowed place. I dirty it with my presence. I stain it with my lofty thoughts. I desecrate it with my account of it.

The dream is dead.

We Write.

We write on napkins. We write on the backs of receipts. We write on scraps of cardboard. We write on street signs and in the stalls of public bathrooms. We write in the dirt, in the dust and in the ashes.

We write when we're happy. We write when we're sad. We write when we're angry and we write when we're excited. We write through tears. We write when we feel like it. And sometimes when we don't. We write in the midst of fond memories. We write to ourselves. We write to lovers. We write to enemies.

We write letters. We write notes. We write memoirs. We write obituaries. We write articles. We write stories. We write poems and we write threats. We write cries for help. We write the truth. We write lies.

We write our thoughts. Our emotions. Our fears. Our hopes. Our dreams. Our secrets. Our desires. Our sins. Our joys. Our tragedies. Our confessions.

We write because we can't imagine what would happen if we don't. We can't bear to think about what would become of us if we weren't allowed to scribble our feeble thoughts down in messy marker, blotchy pens and dull pencils.

We are poets. We are authors. We are children. We are men. We are women. We are young. We are old. We are wise. We are foolish. We are students. We are teachers.

We live. We die.

We write.

We are.

Just Fine

He comes outside through the garage, carrying the last of my things, his long strides bringing him to the car in just a few steps. Mom’s sick and won’t be going this time. Another headache, and car rides make them worse. Today it will just be the two of us.
I feel like I could throw up.
I get in the car first, buckle my seatbelt, and start picking at my nail polish. A habit I’ve been meaning to break. He checks the car one more time, gives the tires a light kick with is foot, and gets in.
“All set?” he asks.
Maybe I should say no.
“Yeah.”
Sand and grit crunch beneath us as the car eases down the driveway and towards the highway. I feel claustrophobic and wish I could read in the car without getting motion sick. The distraction of a novel would be nice. I settle for counting things in and around the car instead.
I’m at 107 rain spots on the window, 3 dead ladybugs on the dashboard, 12 crumbs in the seat, 34 cows outside, 2 abandoned shoes alongside the road and 1 pen cap on the floor when we pull over at the gas station. He always has to get something to drink. Can’t bring it from home, has to stop and get it a half an hour into the trip.
“Do you want anything?” he asks.
I ponder for a moment, I wouldn’t mind a little caffeine, but I shake my head no.
I can see him in the store through the large glass paneling at the front. He’s smiling, talking to some girl. My hands give a slight tremor. He’s always nice to strangers, especially pretty young girls. He’s got a kind of charm with other people that I’ve never experienced, I’ve just heard about it secondhand. I wonder if my mother started out as one of those girls, if that was how she came to think he was the wonderful man she still pretends he is. It’s an easy mistake to make.
He’s taking forever in there, and the car is starting to smell like gasoline now. A man with a bald head and a Hawaiian shirt is staring at me from his car, where he sits chugging a diet soda. I focus on my hands. I really wish he would hurry.
Finally, as the bald man pulls out of his parking space, he comes back out. His from-home economical mug refilled. His smile lingering on his face as we get back on the main road.
The car smells like a dryer sheet, thanks to the lime green basket of laundry shoved behind my chair. If I shut my eyes, I can almost imagine that I am part of an advertisement for Snuggle.
He turns the radio on a few minutes later. Normally I would click it right back off, and a silent war would ensue, but I remember the mp3 stashed in my purse. The slender green device was a gift from him, picked out by my sister.
“Got a good deal on it,” he assured me when I had opened it that Christmas morning.
Relief washes over me as I plug the headphones into my ears. I click start. Nothing happens. Two more successive clicks to the button result in the same outcome. I click it again. What is it about desperation that makes us so persistent? Three more rapid clicks draw a raised eyebrow from him. A message blinks onto the little screen: low battery. Perfect. A sense of defeat settles into the car as I slip the headphones out and slide the mp3 back into my purse.
I rack my mind, trying to come up with something else to focus on, having been denied the escape of music. A familiar song is playing on the radio, so I dial the knob up. I don’t love the song, but it beats the deafening silence. He starts tapping his fingers against the wheel to the beat of the song even though he knows things like that make my skin crawl with irritation.
A few houses drift by, but mostly I see fields turned brown by a winters worth of snow and ice. We’ve about another hour and a half of driving, and the combination of warm sun and the gentle sway of the car relaxes my eyes and limbs with sleep.
My head bounces slightly against the window frame with each crack and bump in the pavement, keeping me from deep sleep, but placing me instead in the in-between place. The place where my mind wanders freely, as if in a dream.
I start to imagine the car crashing. It would never happen of course, he’s too safe a driver. But what if it did? The crunch of metal and cheap plastic would tear his enduring sense of control from his grip right along with the steering wheel. I can picture the surprise on his face before my own smashes through the glass of the window. The ambulance would come, and pronounce him dead, after trying in vain to save him. They would call my mom to tell her the hero was lost, and amidst her tears I imagine a small sigh of relief.
But what of me? What is my fate in this horrible crash? I would earn a body bag too, it’s only fair. That way she wouldn’t have to feign further grief out of motherly duty to me. That and I don’t want to be around for the funeral. I don’t want to pretend either.
What a wonderful caricature of a family we are.
The car slows as we enter the residential area surrounding the campus. Groggy, I rub the lingering signs of sleep from my eyes, my previous thoughts vanishing to the back of my mind. He pulls the car into a parking space, and gives his hair a quick check in the mirror before throwing on a baseball cap and stepping out of the car. I follow him outside, enjoying a stretch before I head around to the trunk.
Two trips and I’m moved back in. Boxes and bags litter the floor, and pile on the chairs. I’ll put it away later. He would like me to put it away now. When it becomes apparent that I’m not going to, and he follows the usual routine of “checking”, as he calls it. As in, ‘I’m just checking’. I call it nagging.
“Did you turn your fridge back on?”
“Yeah.”
He opens the door and checks, nodding.
“You plug everything back in?”
“Yes.”
He makes a quick circuit around the room with his eyes, checking each outlet. Satisfied, he stands by the door awkwardly. I keep standing by my desk.
“So I’ll see you in a few weeks. Don’t forget to turn your forms in. And remember to check out the job opportunity, it’d be a waste for you not to.” This is his way of saying goodbye.
“Sure, I’ll get right on it.” I have no intention of doing any of it, but I’ve learned it’s futile to point that out.
We share a stiff, one-sided hug, he pops his hat back on, and then he’s gone. I can see him pull away from the loading zone from the window in my room. I watch until I can’t see the car anymore.
As I unpack a few things around my desk and set up my laptop again I think about his drive home. It will be much the same as the one here. The radio will play softly in the background, he’ll drive 5 miles under the speed limit and he’ll stop at the gas station to refill his mug before he’s half way home.
And then that thought bursts forth from my mind again.
Maybe his car will wreck.
It’s morbid, I know. I don’t want to think it, but it just keeps clawing at me- taunting me.

I let it continue to poke at me as I fix dinner. Nothing too special, seeing as how I’m limited to microwave cuisine. I decide on soup. While the microwave hums, I open the window to let in a brisk breeze. It’s almost dusk; I can see the sun beginning to descend behind the building next to mine. An hour or so has passed since he left. He should be almost home now. I don’t think I really want his car to wreck. Maybe I just like imagining the changes it would bring out. Maybe I just want a moment to pretend, to act out the scene in my head.
Maybe I honestly want his car to wreck.
The microwave beeps, pulling me back to the reality contained in my small room. But before I can pull out the steaming bowl, my phone rings. I look at the tiny screen on the front before I open it; it’s an unavailable number.
“Hello?”
My mom’s voice crackles and blurs on the other end as she chokes out an answer.
“You’re father’s been in a car accident. On his way home. I’m at the hospital now. You’re sister’s on the way. I just, oh God…”
My hands start to sweat and pinpricks of light mar my vision. The phone slips from my grip and I rush like a broken robot to pick it back up.
“Mom, what happened? I don’t understand.” I understand all right, but I can’t quite shake the feeling that my dreams have turned to full-blown hallucinations.
“Another driver hit him, slid right over the center line. Smashed the car up pretty good. The ambulance had to come for your father.” Her words are rushed, punctuated with gasps of breath. She’s leaving out a crucial detail: what’s his condition?
“What happened to dad? Mom, how bad was he hurt?” My words come out louder than I meant for them to. Their volume surprises me and my mother too, from her stunned silence. But as always, she assumes the best of me.
“Oh my God, you must be worried sick. I’m sorry, I was just so flustered. You’re father is fine honey, he’s okay. Some bruises and scratches, and a broken arm. The doctor said he was very lucky. He’s going to be just fine.”
He’s fine. He’s not taking up space in a body bag. He’s still the hero. He’s fine.
I should feel relief, but I’m feeling something all together different: disappointment. This is no hallucination, because he’s fine.
I drop the phone again.

Let the People Prey

Sunday mornings come too soon. I’ve been going to church since I was a child, and never was there a Sunday I didn’t hate. But, I was never quite sure how to abandon the practice; it’s become a kind of ritual to me. One too sacred to break, and too disturbing to embrace. I take my seat towards the back of the sanctuary, my drab purple skirt crinkling as I sit. Heavy wooden doors close with resounding finality and the room is silent for a few moments.
Abruptly the band begins to play, and it seems much too loud, as usual. The congregation rises from the glossy benches and begins to sing; an electronic screen slides down from the ceiling should anyone have forgotten the words. I too stand, reluctantly, moving my mouth to match the words, but no sound forms in my throat. Mostly I stare at the pastor and his wife, seated front and center. They were the last to sit and the first stand.
The music swells and shifts between a variety of songs, and the pastor begins to clap his hands enthusiastically, one foot keeping pace with the beat. His wife doesn’t join him, but instead shuts her eyes and tilts her head upward. What a perfect couple they make, together becoming the very picture of devout worship.
The pastor and his wife are disappointingly innocent. As pure and ignorant as the white ribbon that winds around the large cross hung in the front of the church. They truly believe themselves to be doing God’s work, I think. And while their displays are ostentatious, I cannot name them false. But the congregation the pastor so foolishly loves and leads? Such filthy secrets they harbor, secrets that infest them like parasites. If I listen close enough I can hear dull, dry whispers of their confessions bounce off the grey walls of the sanctuary.
The time for song has ended and the gallant pastor takes his place behind his sturdy podium. What will he preach about today I wonder? Truth? Love? Purity? All of them will be lost in the sea of sins before him, but the pastor is oblivious. Poor fool.
Directly in front of me sits the local banker in her long sleeved grey dress, making her appear as little more than a shadow beneath her long black hair. She seems innocent enough, but her secrets hang from her body. Reports of missing items trail behind her like receipts. She led communion once, and the pristine white table clothes were not available for use the following month; they had never been returned. Nervous fingers twist a stray thread on her dress, turning her finger a sickly purple before the fiber finally snaps.
Not far from her, only a few seats down, is the navy and khaki clad youth pastor. He’s fairly young, no more than 30. He’s tall, and his inflated sense of self only adds to his height. When not attending business meetings at the church, he hosts a small bible study at his home. The group consists of eight high school girls, and is always conducted on the nights his wife is away. The beautiful bride sits next to him, her peach colored skirt tucked carefully in between her legs and the seat, her hands folded in her lap. I watch her for a few minutes, and she doesn’t move. I have observed her going an entire sermon without moving. Even when her husband’s arm slides around her shoulders, she doesn’t move.
A shudder runs down the base of my neck as I feel the breath of the old man behind me drifting across it, interrupting my thoughts. I try to avoid sitting by him, but at times I am unsuccessful. I reach up and snap the collar of my jacket up around my neck. I can picture what he must look like sitting behind me. His legs will be crossed, with his pants creeping up his ankles, just enough to show the tops of his white socks. Reading glasses will be perched at the tip of his nose, their gold rims catching the rays of the florescent lights on the ceiling. His jaunty cap will be resting on the seat beside him, adding to his grandfatherly appearance. His wife disappeared ten years ago, and they later found her body in the river. Her husband, conveniently, knew little about her disappearance. Much to the adoration of the congregation he was blessed by God with a spirit of forgiveness towards her killer- so much so that he didn’t even cry at her funeral.
Out of the corner of my eye I can see the twenty-something boy located two seats down from the old man. He goes to college here in town, and even today he is sporting his school colors in a bright red sweater vest, layered over a crisp, white button-down. On Sundays, he takes pride in participating in a purity-based bible study after the sermon. On the weekends, he takes pride in screwing any girl on campus that will have him. Today his glances fall on the youth pastor’s wife. Big ambitions, I think to myself. Though I appear to be the only one who has noticed his habits. What an upstanding young gentleman, all the elderly women of the church say, so handsome. A nice boy.
What does anyone here know about nice? I should think their own festering sins would make them all the more aware to the sins of those around them, but the opposite seems to be true.
Beside me sits my favorite of them all. She’s middle-aged, tanned to an orange glow. Every item of clothing on her sports a visible designer label. Every strand of hair is styled to perfection, afraid to move from its assigned place. She has her beady eyes trained on the pastor, squinted in concentration. Every person in this room is guilty of despicable evils, but hers are the most disgusting of all. As always, her mouth is set in a tight line, twitching at the corners every few minutes. I imagine that the twitches coincide with her disgusted thoughts of the people around her. Make no mistake, she shakes hands when we are called to, she participates in devotions weekly, and the offering plate is always heavier after passing her, but the stink of haughtiness overwhelms all of her actions, much like her perfume. Bile rises in the back of my throat. I swallow and pry my eyes away from her.
I look down into my lap, at the Bible that I haven’t bothered to open. My hands itch to heave it across the room, perhaps at the wooden cross. Maybe at the pastor. Maybe out the window.
The pastor calls for us to bow our heads in prayer with him, signaling the end of his sermon. Each head, the liar, the thief, the cheater, the killer and the dozens of others around them, bow in automatic unison. I keep my head up, my eyes open.
I think of performing my own sermon right now. Liars! I would say. Fakes! Hypocrites! Sinners, all of you. I wouldn’t pretend any longer that I didn’t know, that I didn’t see.
But I say nothing. We have a complex parasite relationship, and I mustn’t upset the balance. Instead I rise with them for the benediction.
“Finally, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is pure, whatever is gracious, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things. What you have learned and received, do; and the God of peace be with you. And God’s people said?”
Amen.

At a Distance

He moved here from the Quad Cities over the summer, and today is his first day at school. She does not yet know his name, but she’s seen him around town a few times, his forehead damp with the summer heat as he peddled by. He was always headed confidently in some direction.
But not today.
Today he looks awkward and out of place. He does not appear to have made any friends over the few hot months between his old life and this new one. This speaks more of the others than it does of him. There is not much room for someone like him here. He reads Voltaire and Rand; he writes in his spare time; he is on intimate terms with the record store. There is a pattern to follow here, a form to adhere to, and he’s breaking it. It makes them squirm in their trendy shirts and shiny new shoes.
It’s lunch, and rather than seeking a group to sit with he instead chose to sit alone at a corner table. She thinks of going to sit with him, but hesitates. He’s leaning back in his chair, relaxed, but the fingers of his left hand are drumming rapidly against his knee underneath the table. No food sits before him, just a notebook. He looks ready to stand and leave, but before he can a group finds him, and fills the hard plastic chairs around him. They are drawn to him like children might be to a rare insect- intrigued, terrified and ready to squash it at a moment’s notice. He forces out a smile, a pained one, to satiate the jovial faces that surround him.
She snaps her head back to the incessant chatter at her own table when he catches her eye through a stray lock of his matte brown hair. The look is subtle, but accusing. She looks back up after a moment, and he’s still looking at her. A weak smile turns up the corners of her mouth and to her surprise he returns the gesture before turning his attention back to the faces around him.
His shoulders don’t sag beneath the weight of empty conversation as she thought they might, as she knows her own would. No. Instead, in the midst of his discomfort, he is strong - almost forcibly so. He laughs, but keeps his arms crossed. He answers their probing questions, but keeps his voice steady. He smiles, but doesn’t engage any further. She will come to learn that it is his fear of weakness that keeps him so guarded. He hates sympathy. He relishes playing the role of the misfit, but he cannot tolerate the pity that succeeds weakness. She had made that fatal mistake once, when she told him later that she felt bad about ignoring him that first day. They had been sitting on the bridge near the edge of town. The sky had just begun to melt together into a sea of pinks and yellows when she wondered onto the subject.
“I still feel bad about not talking to you sooner. I mean, you must have felt so lonely. You didn’t look like it, but I knew you had to have felt it anyway. Everyone judging you and talking about you…must have been hard,” she had recalled.
“I would rather be alone than with them, it’s a choice, so save your sympathy.” His voice was even, but it was laced with irritation. He stood to leave, but he paused to look down at her for a moment.
“And you really need to stop worrying about what people think. Have a day where you don’t give a shit, it’d be good for you.”
Four years have passed since that first day. Now she sits next to him on the last day. They are pressed close together, their knees making soft contact, just the coarse polyester of the graduation gowns separating them. He sits next to her now as a companion. Though, when she stops to think about it, he never actually used the word friend. But they had a close relationship nonetheless. Still, in spite of their closeness, there is a distance. As the end of this day leads to a host of others, they will drift apart. He acquired a job at a nearby factory, ignoring the dozens of colleges that had extended their invitation. She chose to attend college a few hours away, and leave him reluctantly behind in the mediocrity of this small town.

He’s sitting next to her, a look of casual uncertainty about his face. He’s relaxed today, in opposition to her own nervous anticipation. He hasn’t bothered to put his cap on yet, he says it looks stupid. He asks her if she wants to blow the whole thing off and go have a smoke.
“I don’t smoke,” she reminds him.
He smiles. “What a shame.”
The ceremony draws to an eventual close, and he heads for the doors, choosing not linger in the sea of celebration spilling into the decorated cafeteria.
“Here,” she says, shoving a book into his calloused hands before he can leave. It’s a paperback of Anthem, his favorite book, wrapped in a bright teal ribbon. She had tied and retied the bow at least three times, until it looked as close to perfect as she could get it.
“Thanks,” he says, wrinkling the bow as he tucks it underneath his arm.
She asks if she can write him. He says sure, but mentions nothing about writing back. She offers her arms to him in a hug and he accepts. In the brief second before he releases her, she thinks how right his arms feel around her. On unsteady legs she steps back from him, giving him up to the greedy darkness beyond the glass doors. An impish grin lights up his face as he walks away.
Green leaves faded to shades of red and orange, and with the cool evening breezes came the start of college. She composed letter upon letter, written upon the splintering wood of her desk, and dropped them into the mailbox with a lingering hope. He never wrote back. What she wouldn’t give for a sheet of his scribbled handwriting or the sound of his rough voice. She still sends him letters occasionally, she doesn’t want to admit defeat, but she’s stopped waiting for an answer.
So, when she catches sight of him from across the street that rainy afternoon she is caught entirely off guard. She is in town to visit a friend for the weekend before returning back to school. As she sees him she misses a step, and comes to an abrupt stop. Rain is blurring his image, but she needs no second glance to know it’s him.
Scruff has taken over his lower jaw, and above it his cheeks have begun to hollow. His shaggy hair is plastered to his head as he stands waiting for the bus; he carries no umbrella. A thin jacket hangs limply from his shoulders, hunched against the pelting drops. His white tee shirt beneath is dirty and stained. Markings of a new tattoo wind their way up from under his shirt and onto his neck. His jeans hang precariously on his hips, with a studded belt doing its best to hold them there. Muscle appears to have given way to bone, and she suspects it has something to do with the lingering sent of smoke that has always surrounded him- even now a cigarette hangs from his mouth. It’s one of the only three things he spends money on: cigarettes, books and music.
His grey eyes are narrowed with his gaze locked straight in front of him. Beneath the dome of her umbrella her face is carefully hidden and he doesn’t appear to notice her. Water is pooling in the cuffs of her pants and seeping through the canvas of her tennis shoes, but she barely notices. Across the street his skin is damp beneath his clothes and she can almost see the drops that cling to his eyelashes and drip down his face.
A couple is standing next to him, their fingers woven together. They huddle under the dull red of their umbrella and murmur to each other contentedly. Looking no more than twenty-three in her bright green rain boots, the woman gently fixes the collar of her lover’s coat. Simple garments shield them from the rain and nothing about them speaks of anything but middle class. But looking at them now, she is jealous. Her gaze flicks back to him, and she wonders if the couple could have ever been them.
“Excuse me ma’am, are you lost?” The voice belongs to an elderly man who has appeared next to her. Deep blue eyes wrinkle in concern beneath the brim of his yellow hat as he peers beneath her umbrella. Standing here in the drizzle of the afternoon has caught the attention of someone, and she is surprised it hasn’t happened sooner. She must look odd staring off across the street.
“No. I’m just, waiting for…someone.” Her voice isn’t as steady as she would like it to be.
“Well shame on the person that’s making you wait out in this rain, not very considerate I’d say.”
She wants to look at the ground and wait for him to leave; she wants to walk away. Instead she forces her eyes to meet his.
“I’m fine.”
The old man’s face is the very picture of doubt, but he relents and continues on down the street muttering something about good sense. She turns her attention back across the street. Her breath catches as she does.
He’s looking at her.
Panic floods her veins and she angles her umbrella so that he can no longer see her. Seconds pass before she peeks out again. He’s back to focusing on something in the distance, no sign of recognition on his face. Relief loosens her limbs, but indignation keeps her heartbeat above normal. Had he forgotten her so easily?
The bus arrives, slinging a spray of muddy water clear up to his knees. Taking one last drag on his cigarette before tossing it to the curb, he walks toward the open door, but as he does so the couple rushes past him and the woman slams her shoulder into his, knocking something from underneath his arm to the ground. Muttered words animate his lips, she’s too far away to hear them, but it is impossible to miss the gesture he offers to the woman with his hand. The woman doesn’t break her stride. Leaning over he gently picks up the object, which she now can see is a book, and gives it a small shake before placing it in his back pocket. She watches as he turns and walks once more to the waiting bus. The title of the book looks familiar, but before she can blink away her sudden tears for a second glance, he is gone.
The foolishness of what she’s doing finally sets in and she resumes walking, but she can’t get the image of him out of her head. Old instinct had told her to cross the street and wrap her arms around his wretched figure, to stop the rain from beating down on him. He wouldn’t have tolerated it of course; he blurred the line between love and pity. Pointless tears run down her pale cheeks; she tries to wipe them away, but can’t keep up. Overwhelmed, she snaps her umbrella shut and lets it hang loosely from her wrist. Rain seeps through the fabric of her clothes and drips from her chin. She welcomes it. For the fifteen minutes it takes to walk to her friend’s house she feels close to him again. As close as they had been on that last day, and just as far away.

Knowledge.

She is staring at him from across the room, her lips clamped together in a thin line. He is always here at this time, and she cannot help but be here as well. Her books are laid out in front of her, with busy looking papers lifeless beside them. She really did come here to work, she tells herself. As soon as she sees his face the deceitful thought vanishes; there is no confusion about why she is here. His face is one that fills her with desire and a kind of desperate, clawing need. Of course he is the reason she’s here.
She knew him once…it feels like so long ago. It was then, in the time before, that she had lost her heart and found it again in his hands. If she had known that this would happen, that his pitiful state would be the end of such rampant emotions, she never would have given him a second look.
But she did. And she knows that ultimately she would not have changed anything. There was something tragic, yet beautiful, about the way things turned out. What with her loving him with a passion that poets write about, and him forgetting her easily enough. Though she cannot blame him- as she authored most of it in her head, building a novel upon words whose meaning she had twisted, and then being angry with him when he would not help her keep the lie standing. There were some words whose meanings she just couldn’t twist to suit her wants.
For a while, however, she thought things might end as she wished. She had thought that they could make it work, opposites though they were. She had once thought that she might have him in the end and that all her pain would not be for nothing. She wonders if he had ever believed so. It is doubtful, he was always the realist. He had been saying goodbye since he met her.
But would she love him if he were anything but that which he is? Of course not. She knew this. She did. She simply let his smile distract her for a while. It is perhaps his smile that she misses most. What she would enjoy first if she could have him back.
And she does want him back. Sitting here in the crowded shop, with her view of him distorted by the faces and bodies of strangers, she wants him back. Part of her knows that it is not worth it, that he would come with more than just a smile. He would come with pain, agony and a confusion of self- but she would gladly endure all those things. She would gladly accept a life of uncertainties and of confrontations if only to have him. She would leave behind all that she knew to be with him. She would set aside good judgment for him. She is in many ways like a petty child, wanting that which is bad for her and refusing to heed to the consequences.
There is a problem, however, in her fantasy world of wants: he does not want her. He has already made his choice, assuming there was one, and it was not her. It will never be her. This too she knows. As she absentmindedly stirs her now-cold drink with spoon it occurs to her that she knows an awful lot. She knows him. She knows what she wants. She knows the two are the same. She knows she cannot have him. She knows. She knows. She knows.
She is doomed to know.

Dead and Gone

They stand around her with complacent smiles, formed in strained sympathy. She is surrounded by those who will never understand, and do not want to. As they huddle together in their eager commiseration she finds an escape, striking off towards town and towards the bridge.

She feels better when she finally arrives at the site, as if a hand had been around her neck had suddenly been removed. The cheap suits and wilting flowers have been replaced with the crashing waves and groans of the bridge beneath her. There is no sympathy here at this wooden monument; no sad faces, save for her own. No judgment of his choice. No muttered words of disgrace and tragedy.

They have all told her not to come here, they said it wasn't healthy. But this is the only place she can still feel him. She couldn't feel him as he lay in the casket, his face so unnaturally pale. She couldn't feel him beneath the cold marble of this headstone. But here, standing with her face towards the grey waters that he chose to loose himself to, she can feel him. His whispers are the cool wind and his mummers the gurgle of the water as it flows across the rocks below. If she shuts her eyes she can almost feel him standing next to her, waiting.

The sun has begun its journey down to its western resting place, turning the dark river a brilliant collage of reds, pinks and yellows. The trees along the shore match the fiery hues. They have lost the life that once turned their leaves vibrant shades of green. They have begun to curl and fall.
Maybe that's what happened to him, maybe he lost the color in his life. Perhaps it had all become a photograph in shades of grey and black. Maybe he leapt into the colors of the river, hoping to find life through death.

She can only guess at what compelled him to leave.
She should have come back sooner...she should have never left.

No. His choice had nothing to do with her. Even if she had been standing on the rough wooden ledge next to him he would have jumped. He would have looked her in the eyes and asked her forgiveness as he stepped forward, into the one place she couldn't follow. He would have let her watch his body twist as it fell, finally smashing into the oblivion below. He would have believed her to be strong enough to witness his final work of art.

Her vision blurs with hot, heavy tears. I miss you, she weeps.

She wishes that she could be angry, that she could beg him to return. But the anger would taste of lies, and to ask him to stay would be to deny him his last sense of freedom. To ask him to stay would be to ask him to suffer. She cannot do so. Will not do so. She can only mourn him for a time. She can only carry the fragments of him that remain in her heart.

She can only remember.

Photograph

As she holds the photo before her face memories come flooding back, like some great body of water. Waves of time long forgotten fill her lungs. Has it really been ten years? Surely the weeks could not have turned into years so quickly...
His face looks exactly the same as she remembers. His smile, the sparks in his eyes. His bangs strewn across his forehead, his expression sure and steady. None of it has changed. And the wounded boy still lurks beneath the surface, silently begging for help; words his mouth would never utter. She still longs to reach out and take away the pain- the torment.
Fate did not allow her to.
Perhaps it never would, no matter how much she longed to.
Did he remember her? Or has she become just a cobweb of a distant memory? Would she ever hear his voice again- hear his words whispered to her, followed by a secret grin?
Brief laughter, hidden smiles, buried anguish. Did they still plauge his dreams as they did hers? she wonders.
She caresses the photo one last time before placing it back in the book, a tear finding its way to the pages before she can snap the front cover shut. Her unsteady hands place it back on the well-worn shelf.
Fate was too cruel.