Finally above us the waves have come.

XVI.

I’ve listened to this same song thirty-two times in a row. I feel like I’m running out of things to say because everything I want to say has already been said by other people, been written in books and in songs. In the love letters never sent and the time between when eyes meet and they linger for minutes that seem like hours, days quickly passing by; the leaves outside on the trees are falling and everyone continues with their daily routines. But they don’t care. All that matters is the words not spoken by lips, but by irisies, by retina’s. By the all-too-brief brush of their arm against yours, the accidental bump in the hallway, the smile that was not truly intended for you, but you took it that way, anyway.

We are the hopelessly hopeful prisoners of our own selfish minds and bodies.

I don’t know, none of this makes sense right now. I’ll pull the quilt over my eyes until I’m needed.

XV.

“I’m in love with your mind, and your heart, and your soul. And I wish you would write more, your thoughts have saved my life more than once.”

To this day, these words are one of the few things that make me want to continue leaving my bed in the morning and when I repeat them over in my head, quite honestly, they set me aflame. I’ve never been told something so heartfelt and true. I have not decided if this is a good or bad thing. I wish I knew who said this.

It’s only nine forty-five central time and yet, my bones are aching and I swear, I can feel my heartbeat pounding between my eyes. Something is wrong (with me). I’ve been sleeping sixteen or more hours every night for the past week and a half and I still manage to be more tired than I’ve been in months. My brain keeps trailing its way back to you, no matter how hard I try to abstain. It’s getting so freezing out. My hands are always cold like ice. I hope it snows soon.

I feel sick.

XIV.

“What are you trying to prove,” you asked, “that you can run from who you once were?”

I brush my hair from my eyes, focusing on the loose strands of carpet poking from the navy ocean beneath my feet.

“You can ignore your problems and run and run and run until battery acid starts pumping through your veins and your lungs burst, but it’s not going to erase the fact that you’re still miserable.” You say this matter-of-factly, almost angrily. “And a drunk,” you add at last minute.

I scoff after what seemed like an eternity of not breathing. I look down at my hands and notice that my cuticles have been pushed back as far as they can go and my nails have been chewed to hell. Bad habits have always crept up on me. Petty, but seemingly significant.

“I mean, it’s like you’ve trained yourself to to stop caring, about everything. Even yourself. Did you drop off the face of the Earth? You never call anymore, you never come to drink tea with me on Sunday mornings anymore and to read the paper. There’s no inkling that you’re even alive unless I happen to drop by because I’m feeling sorry for you.” You stop, breathe for a moment. Out of the corner of my eye, I see you rub your forehead softly, your caribbean pools hiding behind your eyelids for a moment. There are more wrinkles in the crevices of your eyes than I remember, and before I’m even able to mutter a word, you start up again.

“And you’ve let your apartment become a mess. There are so many clothes on the floor, I don’t think I can even recall what it looks like. The dishes are piling up and I’m not even going to start with the overflowing amount of trash. Clearly, you don’t believe in cleaning anymore.”

I wait for you to settle down, obviously having become flustered, before I say anything. My head is pounding and I sigh, “I’m just tired.”

You flatten out your shirt and run your hand through your bark coloured hair- but, you pause, your eyebrows raising. “You know what, I’m done. Finished. I’ve tried so hard to help you out, but at some point, all of this has to stop and you’re going to have to move on with your life.”

And with that, you briskly walked to the door, turned the knob and with one last hopeless look at me in my sullen state, you walk out, lightly closing the indestructible wall I built between us.

XIII.

When other kids were learning to ride their bikes, I was teaching myself how to make coffee for my father to wake him up so I wasn’t late to school because he was too hungover and asleep to do it himself. When kids were busy dreaming of their definition of Neverland, I was wide awake and alone, listening in on my parent’s arguments, determining whether or not I’d have to hide under my bed or in my closet to escape the frustration that was taken out on me; when children had their mothers fill their ears with soft promises like, “I love you, I love you, I love you, did you know that? You’re my everything.”, mine were filled with, “You’ll never amount to anything, you’re worthless. You fucking disgust me.”

Yes, if you were curious, you are the center of all my anger. I will make you eat your words.

XII

I do not want to drive home tonight. There is an uneasy feeling slamming at the walls of my stomach. An anxious feeling of purposeness not yet fulfilled under fluorescent glory.

I hope they find me curled up on some floor, exposed and love-drunk, like out of one of your nightmares. You are sharp like maple on the tip of my tongue.

XI

I’ve sat here for hours trying to determine who to write this to: the person who completely changed every aspect of my life or the person who forcibly ripped my eyes open. I was always dumbstruck around you, words stuck inside my swollen throat. I’d play connect the dots in my mind to the freckles splashed across your stomach and resist the urge to blend my lips with yours. There was a frailty in the way you spoke, in the way you’d whisper to me, “there’s nothing in the world that compares to the way your breath on my neck makes me feel.” Truth is, every time you said something to me, regardless if it were just a simple “hello”, it always sent me into a never ending spiral of euphoric warmth.

On certain days, specifically the kind like today, where it’s overcast weather and it’s cold enough that the wind slaps you across the face, only softly, like a child’s hand, I still taste you. Salty, but with a slight hint of tangerine. It was a taste I had become so accustomed to, I wanted it every waking moment. There is a subtle cringe in my spine when I think about the feeling of your fingertips against my eyelids.

Your naked body against mine, I’d never known something as pure.

X

He said, “I might have cancer.”

My hands shook and my vision blurred. I felt wobbly on my feet, and I could’ve passed out right then. The afternoon light pouring through the window danced with my auburn irises; it was so bright, I thought it may burn my eyes right out of their sockets.  It only took a second for my heart to sink into my stomach and to imagine my entire world falling apart. The support beams I’ve constructed for you and I are slowly beginning to crumble.

I haven’t left my bed since.