And it was one step closer to the end. I left my apartment with no mind of where to go but I heard him shout “hurry up you don’t have much time until you grow up” so here I am with a pocket full of change and optimism. Down thirty first street the drummers drum thier roll, I step to the beat, I count the patterns with my feet. I still have no mind of where to go or where I am going but, I must  hurry before I get old. My favorite coffee shop I pass, the smile of the freckled boy almost lured me in but I felt it’d be best to just walk right past. I hold my head down so no one sees me escaping my past and entering a future so foggy I can’t even find my way. I don’t worry about tomorrow or what the sidewalks will bring for I must hurry before I get old. I pass the sign that tells me where I am headed and it is one step closer to the end

The staircase looked to be painted green or something meant to be blue but ended up green
The green was chipped with flakes of brown hardwood poking through the crevices
Of the emerald color. I stepped on the first staircase remembering the warm Augusts there but mostly the fall. His coat was still hanging on the pole connected to the railing I glanced at it and it glanced back at me. Staring into my soul but my weeping eyes as I remembered what it felt like to be in love. His coat smelled of cologne and dried rain. I put it over my shoulders, tears falling into place.
This staircase in our home belonged to us and only us, but then he left and now it is only me, It is only me with all my faults and ripped jeans too big to fit my withering waistline as I count the days gone by. I count the days on the calendar marking a tiny X in the corner hoping still he might walk through the door. I hope still, that he would greet me with the same expressions he once did before, always first asking me about my day. Now I enter my home with empty dreams and dark memories with no one to call out my name. The staircase was for us, it was the road map to our dreams. The staircase carried our first boxes all marked and packed with things that belonged to us. The staircase carried our long nights after staying up late, talking about things only we knew.
The Staircase who was once emerald green carried what I thought to be our future but ended up as a memory from the past in only a matter of seconds. I never knew why he left me sitting upon that staircase, my head buried in the palms of my hands atop that staircase . He left in a fit of rage with the idea of never coming back, I didn’t think that was so.  But now this staircase carry’s regret, for I shouldn’t have said what I said but the staircase knew I only wanted what was best. The staircase may also carry my future, I just haven’t discovered what that might be yet.

The home I grew up in was once of subtle yellows and green- moms favorite colors. When dad came home yelling that September night the walls caved in. Our home was broken but not literally so.
Mom and dad would scream while brother and I sat cold, we waited till he was done and we knew mom would be up soon. My bedroom was my safe haven, I had it as my own. Fairy lights dancing along my walls, darkness still crept in. The home I grew up in wasn't charming as it looked from beyond, it was crumbling, held up by Mother and warm tea.

And I know it hurts the most when you think about him at 4 am, you’re gasping for air trying not to make a sound, the crying is loud.

You can’t be loud or they will hear. I hope you find a love even better than him, a love that’ll make your depression disappear.

But if you can’t find the love, don’t go searching just let it come to you. Let love flow in like a waterfall on the edge of a desert shore. Please love, you will find it, just stay a bit longer

This is my life. I have to be okay with the dark presence that looms over me, and I have to accept that I won’t be able to expel him for I must make friends with him to get my way. I have taught my self to just breathe every time I hear his loud footsteps coming up the stairs and not to duck underneath my covers or shout my mother's name. I learned to keep my distance, and In the darkest hour of the night even when he creeps through these halls, I must keep my composure and swallow my pills until the shaking has gone away. He goes by the name Dad, but he’s treated me unlike so, and now I don’t look him in the eye or laugh any longer than I should because one day I’m scared of what’ll happen if I do. I’m afraid of the day when I will lose to the darkness that creeps inside rooms once light and beautiful and changes the presence for good. Rooms once light now dark and dreary.

And even though it hurts the most to say I love you, I always will. In stolen moon light I sit writing something of hope and what could be happiness. My words are broken like my heart, my mind is cold like December. In fallen leaves I found love on an October evening in the middle of no where reading books of fairytales that never seemed to come true. I wrote Dad at the top of a paper I hoped to finish writing but, in reality I  don’t even know where to start. Where do I begin when love has no ending, where do I begin when once what was love is gone...

There was something of October that reminded me to make sure you were still there. In the morning when I woke I rolled to your side to see you breathing softly and slowly like a babies first good nights rest. Something about last October reminded me of when he left without a warning or a note that I could crumple up and burn in a fire full of depression and self doubt. I curled up in the armchair facing you just watching you stay and promise to never let go. I wanted my old lover to be that way too, I wanted him to walk on fall leaves and sip cinnamon tea as the nights grew longer as time went. I wished upon a lonely star that he would be just like you but all the hoping turned into sorrow for nothing but his shoe prints were left upon the bottom stair and a string of his curly hair on my rain jacket.

She was a swan. A swan of white and subtle grey who would dance around my kitchen in the middle of the night. Her fingers pricked the edges of my face as she slowly lifted my frown into the first smile i’d seen in awhile. She was a dancer but not like the elegant ones you see in the ballet shows, she had a mind of her one. She was the ugly duckling but a beautiful one indeed. The way her white feathers caressed my thoughts kept me guessing. The way she danced kept me wanting more.

Be the flower that never stops blooming. Be the rose on a rainy day and be the sunflower on a summer afternoon. Be the model and make them tempted to tear you from your roots. Feel the hurt when they rip you from the ground and treat you like a doll, but know you aren’t a doll for sometimes pretty hurts. Know what it feels like when someone else appreciates your beauty. - I hope one day they take pictures of you and hang you on their wall

I will wait up for the happiness that once belonged to me. I will kiss the robins in the early morning and the fall leaves right outside my window. The books waiting to be read, I will read them, to pass the time, some a better read than others, but I will read them anyway. The darkness will go away soon as long as I light the candle each night. I will hug the flames, feeling the fire enter my body. I will glow like never before. I will be the light until the happiness that once belonged to me returns.

Along the meadows the sun shone its bright colors, glorifying the beauty of nature. I knew I was right where I wanted to be. I knew the wind howling in the distance was a call from the birds who were ready for me to come outside and play. School was almost over and the kids were riding bikes along the paths of sunshine and yellow flowers. The sun woke me up that day and I knew that I was right where I needed to be. With the sun shining over me and the sound of the birds just waiting for me to come outside and play.

The corner store, just a short walk from the docks, the one made of honey and fresh peaches. I remember it like it was yesterday bare feet and pebbled rock. From the shore the children would run, mom and dad gave a nickel for ice cream. I rode my bike on a summers afternoon and I rung my bell as I neared closer to the hot pressed waffle cones. Mr. Wright became my friend on a summer night, he ran the general store. I’d go in and we’d talk for hours, a fresh coca cola and a fudge sickle bar. I wish Mr. Wright was here on this fine night where I am feeling a little more lonely. I wish Mr. Wright wasn’t flying high with the birds singing the same song he always sang. I wish for a Coca Cola and I dream of something of dasies and open fields.

I laid in bed that night with a cold feeling in the pit of my stomach. Not winter but fall. It was back in my home. The darkness I felt winters ago, perched up on my windowsill begging the sun to shine for just one day. I felt his silence when I knew he was near. My heart was heavy and cold, I could hear his words creeping up on me in the night. It was dark. But I could feel the pain rushing back in. It was dark and there was a lonely cat outside my window.

They say there are ways to cope and writing is one but all we wish for is the cure. In the storm and chaos of everything summer, we only wish to smell the roses a little while longer until the thought of the killer shark takes over our minds leading us to a place where we’re too afraid to swim. I go to the beach and look at the waves only to wish I could dip my sanded feet into the water letting the chills take over me. Anything and everything we’d do just to feel free.

It was raining that morning and I had awoken to your soft touch on my rosy, red, cheeks as I laid in bed ill and still tired. Your song you used to sing to me every morning washed through my head like the waves do on a tropical island. You whispered in my ear and told me I’d be alright and asked if maybe I would like some tea. I was sick but I loved it, I wanted your arms held around my aching body, I wanted to finally feel loved and wanted and you made me feel as so. So maybe it isn’t so bad to be sick in bed, maybe the tea and the soft rain was all worth it, but only so I could be loved again.

It was December and the sun rested upon its cloud.
night.
I sang in the shower that night. I even combed through my messy curls. More pulling than combing. But I combed.
In the mirror. My reflection. It glanced at me and smiled back and even had the same beauty mark upon its lower cheek. We were the same.
I wondered what it was like to be the least favorite in the garden.
Did roses think lily’s were ugly? Roses were beautiful.
sad. Upon some time you would grow lonely. Tired. Un whole.
Empty. I was empty because I felt ordinary.
I was ordinary nothing too good. Not anything bad. Ordinary.
In afternoons walking past the roses I saw myself as a Dandelion. The ugly one.
The ugly duckling. The ugly flower. The ordinary.