they say that i'll get over him
but when they say that they aren't thinking about the same things as me

about how he moved on inside of two weeks after we broke up
and how i had loved him unconditionally for the past 9 months of my life
or how he knows my secrets and i know his and that's what trust is, right?

he wasn't mine
and i think i believed that he was for too long
and now it's turned into a habit

She asks me if I would like to come in now
She asks me if I have been waiting a long time
She asks me to take a seat
She asks me if I would like a glass of water
I rarely turn down free stuff, so I say “okay”
She asks me about my degree
She asks me about how I’m coping in this cold weather
I’m good at small talk and can drag it out until the real issue is forgotten
She asks me how I’ve been this week
She asks me if I have seen my doctor recently
She asks me to grab a tissue from the box opposite her
allergies, I promise.
She asks me why I came to see her
She asks me to slow down a bit
So I do
and she sits
and she listens
so I breathe
I breathe again, but deeper this time
I am exposed, but not afraid
I begin.

"It's Monday tomorrow."
My mother reminds me again.
Deadlines for assignments. night classes and spending money for transportation and meals happen again, in a ravenous cycle of time, growth and worry.
It's Monday tomorrow.
I'm turning twenty. And so is my birthday another cycle to be showered upon with special greetings, after all, people give all they can to one person mostly just on their special day. The twentieth year. A cycle of time, growth and worry.
In my family, we never entertained the ideas of birthdays.
It's Monday tomorrow.
Just another ordinary day for me.
Spending money on transportation and meals, night classes and deadlines for assignments.
Oh, and the deadline of my nineteenth.

We stand on the sidewalk
cousin Jamie and me, with

a bible in my right hand,
I drape my left arm

around her lopsided
shoulders and cold brace;

she seldom smiles,
even as the shutter clicks.