“His voice became taut as he ran his hand down his jawline and back to the mug in front of him. It was empty, but he held onto it like the warmth from the black coffee hadn’t left it and stared into the bottom as if looking for a world beyond where he was. 

'Tell me,' he breathed, 'was it your mother or your ex-lover who first taught you that you ought to be afraid of heights?
Who told you that the fall would be so bad?
Do you ever think it’s unfair to let others around you jump when you can’t even work up the courage to climb down the ladder to catch them at the bottom? Forget falling as fast as I did, but did you even look over the edge?'
Her breath caught in her throat as she fought tears and opened her mouth to explain as he cut her off,

'Who taught you that you should fear the places you try to forget instead of making peace with them?
Why won’t you tell me about your grandmother’s house or where you spent eighth grade?
Why do you feel like you can’t heal or forget or at least be comfortable with the reality that you never want to go back?
Why do you feel more at home in a city full of strangers than in a room with people you’ve grown up with and how come you won’t let me be your comfort?
Is it really so bad that you’d rather spend a night in a city that never sleeps instead of a night in with me?
How did it get to this point of uncertainty?
How did I not see this coming?'
He cleared his throat as he tapped his fingers against his mug, placing each finger against the ceramic as though it were the neck of a guitar. When he spoke again it was thin,

'Where did you learn to have a high-speed come apart every time things are looking up?'
His chin lowered but his eyes stayed on her face, pleading for so much as a change in her expression but she remained silent, the lump in her throat threatening tears at any second. 
Finally he croaked,
'I just wish to be the place your heart finds solace, I just want to give your soul a rest. I know it’s cliché but I just want to be your favorite.'"

Paint me pretty, paint me bright,
Capture me in this adoring light.
Wish as you may, wish as you might,
Thing will never be as they are tonight.
Baby blue, cotton candy pink,
A yellow that pales next to my smile, you think.
Never a portrait, always a scene,
Easier to forget if I'm just a color scheme.
Lavender because it's my favorite scent,
Green to reflect how my irises glint.
Willows, weeping, for all that's been lost,
A field once vast now covered in frost.
When they look at the paintings what do they see?
Water lilies and bridges, never me.
Try as they will, try as they might,
only love makes you wonder at this sight.

The only pink house on the street,
Vulnerable.
I dreamt about being lost,
But I was free to be who I want.
Like the dock that seemed to be hiding under the water,
Confused.
Unlike the small turtle crossing the road alone,
I have real friends.
The wildflowers that sprout along the main road
Must be self-conscious like the people who were evicted from apartment 66.
Independence,
Like Christmas lights in mid-July.

Pretty (adj):
1. pleasing or attractive to the eye, as by delicacy or gracefulness;
"Pretty" is a word that's been spewed at you since the day you were born,
A social standard set upon you that you had yet to even hear, but it was being used to describe you instantly;
A "pretty little girl", a "pretty face", "pretty eyes", "pretty smile", "pretty outfit",
Did anyone ever stop to wonder if you'd have a pretty soul?
What about the way you could be brought to tears at the thought of shaming homeless people or victims of abuse, how your heart felt like it was ripping out of your chest when you heard about someone who was struggling,
They didn't seem to care that you tested highest in compassion, they just wanted to know where you got your dress from.
As you grew older the adjective turned from an innocent compliment to what seemed like a snide remark,
The word "pretty" began to eat you from the inside out every time it was said
like you should measure your worth in how delicate others find you;
You stopped accepting "pretty" as a compliment when it turned into an adjective that was only associated with girls that were more than average but less than beautiful,
You stopped accepting "pretty" as a compliment when it became an antonym of strong,
like "pretty" girls were things that would break if you talked too loud, as if loving a "pretty" thing could never be synonymous with loving a durable or sturdy or resilient thing.
D.A. Sharp once said
"You weren't meant to be pretty; you were meant to burn down the earth and graffiti the sky. Don't let anyone ever simplify you to just "pretty"."
And so when someone kindly placed the word in a sentence referring to you you learned to automatically put it into quotations because they were just trying to be nice,
They didn't know they were reducing you to outer beauty, that "pretty" seemed less like a compliment the more it was said, like people couldn't figure out another way to describe you,
As if God hadn't already intricately woven the threads of your DNA, as if he hadn't perfectly tinted every hair on your head to be its crisp burnt color or hand painted the irises of your eyes,
No, "pretty" could no longer cut it.
Because you had been made for bigger and better things,
Those "pretty" eyes of yours will one day see things that God hadn't originally intended anyone to have to see, and those "pretty" hands of yours will have to pick up the pieces of a heartache that God had never wanted you to know and put them back together, and those "pretty" lips of yours are the same lips that will stand in front of sin and tell it that you have chosen Jesus.
Because "pretty" is fine,
but you have been fearfully and wonderfully made, a masterpiece of the Creator.

Vulnerable
Like the small turtle crossing the road alone.
Confused
Like having Christmas lights out in mid-July.
Self-conscious
Like the dock that seemed to be hiding under the water rather than conquering it.
I dreamt about being lost
Like the people in apartment 66 who have been evicted
Free to be the person I want to be
Like the wildflowers that sprout along the road.
Independence here
Like the only pink house on Hoffman Street.
Real friends
Like being part of a flock,
Like being part of a town,
Like being a part of my Poughkeepsie.