The sun’s sinking slowly from view in the window behind your head
as we lie on the couch pretending
like their isn’t an elephant in the room.
Your eyes are anxious and heavy but there’s a smile in your voice
as you throw the ball down the hall
again and again laughing as your dog chases after it. Something wasn’t right,
I could see the scar on your chin
from across the room but I pretended that I didn’t see it
or the little indents on your nose
from your glasses you wore until three that afternoon.
You throw the ball my way expecting the result to be different
than throwing it down the hall, but
that’s insanity.
Doing the same thing over and over
but expecting a different result.
I look at you,
my mind flooding with the thought of you bringing out something different in me.
You start mumbling again as the ball bounces off the walls and I try to pretend
that I don’t like who I am when I’m with you. But I can’t; I’m addicted.
Addicted to the cure
that allows me to love myself in the real world rather than just in a land of make believe.
Getting up and walking across the room
ignoring the babbling coming from your lips,
I sit down beside you
watching our shadows now created by the rising moon outside that same window.
Your eyes are full of life and everything I've never known.
You open your mouth to say something, but laying my head on your shoulder, I whisper
“Just shut up and let me pretend it'll be us in the end”

It’s 12:08 on a Saturday night and I can’t help but notice the stutter in your breaths
as the speedometer ticks 45,
50,
60.
The wind whips across the top of the open Jeep making both of our hair fly as you turn to look at me.
I looked up at the dull constellations in the sky
trying to avoid the stars I knew were in your eyes.
There’s a tickle on my leg and I look down to see your fingertips tracing tiny circles on the skin above my knee.
The pressure on my thigh gets tighter and I look up to see everything
swimming in your eyes mimicking the look you had when we used to talk ourselves in circles.
The car runs over the rumble strips forcing you to look away and quickly becoming my saving grace from the question I knew was coming:
what are you thinking?
Slowing down to 15 below the speed limit, swerving left and right
in a lame attempt to avoid the never ending *** holes on a back road I didn’t even know existed, we sat is silence.
It’s 12:43 as you put the car in park and say you want me
happy, say you’re ready to commit,
that you know things are different now but that’s not good enough reason to quit.
The full moon shines light on the black silhouette in front of me defining your messy hair, nervous look, and everything eyes.
I whisper I want you happy too, but your fear hasn’t died,
and that there’s nothing romantic about a joint suicide.
We’d crash and burn, get lost in our teenage addictions without caring who or what we hurt.
It’s 1:37 and you pull off again except I remember this spot from the summer after junior year.
Unlike now, it was warmer that night we were last here when the crickets echoed our conversations of love, loss, and regret.
With two simple clicks the headlights were off and the world around us seemed to stand still. I could hear your breathing
getting heavier and faster as you gently cradled my face in your hands
duplicating the night we earlier said that we regret.
Taking in your dimly lit face, you pull my forehead to yours as that song comes on talking about how we used to be so young and self assured.
I realized a rush like this doesn’t come from caffeine
because before I knew it,
you were all over me like we were back at 17.

You left
but seeing the blue of your eyes mirrored in the sky
on a hot August day takes me back
to that first summer when the freckles on my skin were as prominent as the seeds in the middle of the sunflowers
your neighbor planted next door a few months back.
The rain hitting the cracked pavement outside the window of my favorite coffee shop
is a constant reminder of the day you told me about heartache
that would never stop hurting no matter how many ice cream cones we ate
in that old tree house we build in the 8th grade.
Seeing waves crash into one another with my toes in the sand
sends flashbacks of that cold, January trip where the wind was so strong
you didn’t even want to get out of the car to show me the spot you ran to
when life was becoming too much to just nod and smile through.
Running the paths along the river where the railroad tracks used to be
makes my muscles ache just like they did that day we avoided all responsibilities
and decided to climb the rock wall because we were too lazy to hike an actual trail
but too ambitious to stay inside and watch a rerun of Saturday Night Live.
Sitting in my car waiting for the train to clear the tracks reminds me of the countless September nights
we spent sitting on my porch snacking and listening to the train three blocks over
wondering and wishing it would pick us up and take us anywhere else.
Bubble gum popping is echos the memory when you popped my huge hubba bubba bubble
at the drive in the night you bribed me into seeing that action movie
you knew I didn’t want to see, but insisted on anyway.
Clowns at the Memorial day parade tossing candy to the kids lining the street
mimic the Skittles you threw at me as you screamed “I told you so”
when I finally admitted to liking that rapper you never shut up about.
Any scary movie haunts me like the Mexican restaurant off the corner of West Main Street
because it was there you told me you were leaving.
I’m sitting here considering burning  my favorite blue and white stripped sweater
you gave me for my 21st birthday because it was the last time
you told me everything was going to be alright.
It didn’t matter that I moved away
because I saw you in the face of strangers passing on the street.
I’ll never get to send you off or give you away
things have changed and both of us have grown
but we live in a world made of each other
so we’ll never be alone.

I’ve gotten use to broken promises
from the girls who used to pass notes  with me in fourth period geometry
when the teacher wasn’t looking. The crumbled up pieces of notebook paper
coated in scribbled words disguising the secret nicknames
we gave to the guys we didn’t want anyone else to know about still lay scattered
throughout random, dust covered boxes

in my bedroom. I’ve gotten used to the whispers
from those in passing who claimed to only wanted the best for me
as long as that meant proofreading their papers and being available whenever they needed something. Holding their hair back from the after effects of the bonfire Saturday night
knowing they wouldn’t even remember

I was there come the morning light.
I’ve gotten used to being second
compared to those who have more. The red ribbons
and second place certificates coat the walls of my house
serving as a constant reminder to push harder
but know there’ll always someone else

better. I’ve gotten used to lustful words from the boys who claim to love me
as long as my leggings and white t-shirt are lying on the floor
of their bedroom come Friday night.
The radio always seeming to play

the same song which you sang to me that first day.
You reminded me that I was more than whispers in the silence,
broken promises,
and love shown through violence.

I drive past the road leading to your house
signing the same song about how I’m doing just fine
but this empty bed is something I’ll never get used to.
It lacks the warmth of your body filling the vacant spots
mine weren’t touching. It’s missing your extra pillows
that used to speckle the sheets like raindrops
on the pavement outside.
I’ve gotten used to the winds
and the sky not always being blue, but I could never get use to
how I lost you.

Sometimes I wake up in a different room, lying barely covered
in a strange bed with an unfamiliar scent coating the oversized t-shirt blanketing my upper body.
The alarm clock across the room blinked
what I decided was an inaccurate time
based off the amount of sunlight peeking out from behind the corner of the sheet
taped to the top of the window seal in a poor attempt to keep the room in shadows.
The unknown room around me was messy but provided no comfort
like the clothes speckled floor of your apartment once did. Some mornings
I can’t even remember the name of the new, handsome man making breakfast
because you’ve infected my thoughts and clouded my mind
making it so I can’t leave you behind.
The smell of French toast circles through the air above me.
I hated the taste

but only you knew that. I managed to crawl out of that mysterious pile of sheets
and walk to stare in the cracked mirror.
Dazed and unaware of what happened the night before,
I realized I don’t even recognize who I am anymore.

The headlights from passing cars on the not so distant highway let off just enough glow
for me to see the rings float away from your lips and fill the car
I would have to air out later before my parents discovered I didn’t actually go to Denny’s
for the late-night pancake special. I didn’t care
that I would have to stay up once I got home to wash my clothes because you had never looked as ****
as you did in that moment. I was staring at the tattoo
peeking out from underneath the sleeve of your favorite grey shirt when you started to laugh.
         What, I whispered
anxious about the sudden interruption of silence.
           You’re so high, escaped your lips
in-between another hit. I joined in your laughter.
What you said was true,
but it wasn’t off of THC
        it was off of you.

The snow outside my small window had just started to fall again
coating the frozen grass with a fresh white blanket that only encouraged me to stay snuggled up in my bed
under layers of fuzzy fabric. The sounds outside that condensation covered window
started to fade as my alarm clock ticked to another early hour of the morning.
        I should be sleeping
but instead I'm trying to study notecards for my anatomy exam in-between checking my phone
hoping you responded to that message
I sent a thirty seconds ago.
            One minute,
      two,
                   four
minutes later I’m struggling to remember where a protein is made
because I can’t drag my eyes away from the same, black screen that’s been staring back at me
since I sent that message five and a half minutes ago.
I give up on memorizing the functions of an organelle and turn out my light
trying not to focus in on how your hair would look
with little white flakes speckling it.
            Eight minutes
after I was picturing the outline of your face, imagining the perfection in every curve and line
I’m comforted by the faint scent of cigarettes on your skin and your hands grabbing my hips
as your body pushes against mine. I forget all about the snow
coming in through the opened window beside where we were
whispering back and forth in the dark room only illuminated by a random car passing by the building.
Breathing in deeply attempting to flood my brain with what I was feeling,
kissing the nicotine seeping up through your skin, praying it circulates through my blood
      and holds me over until the next time the snow comes down
and you blanket me like the white powder covering the frozen ground outside.