Twenty-one: they called me in the middle of the night, the hospital smelled stale, like death and frustration and hope. Twenty-one: the woman who was supposed to cry at my wedding is gone, leaving me with only a tox screen that says her blood alcohol was at least four times the legal limit and the wreckage of a car wrapped around a pole. The police officer said there were no skid marks. My world falls out from under my feet... Twenty: we’re not talking. She’s picked him over me once again so we’re taking a break. She left a voicemail about Christmas but I don’t think I’m ready to face her yet. Nineteen: I’m travelling around Europe when my brother calls. She’s in the hospital because her boyfriend pushed her down a flight of stairs. I’m on a the first plane home, terrified that he’s the only one at her bedside. Nineteen: I’m leaving to start my life. Nineteen: she promises me that she’s going to leave him.
Eighteen: she tries to promise she’s better. Seventeen: silence. Sixteen: I move out without telling her. My entire life packed into a single dufflebag. It’s hard to breathe. Fifteen: we go on a vacation to Disney World - she slaps me across the face in the middle of the park. He tells me to stop being such a baby and grow-up. I can feel the ground beneath my feet starting to crumble. Fifteen: I cry myself to sleep to the sound of screaming. Fourteen: a pan flies through the air at my head. He screams at my brother and me as if he’s our father. Thirteen: his kids have stopped talking to him. Mom told us that it’ll be okay. He left angry and drunk last night. Twelve: my mom found out I like a girl tonight. She won’t look at me so, instead, I look in a mirror and wonder what I did wrong. Twelve: everyone says I look just like my Mom. Eleven: Mom started dating a new guy. He’s okay. His cooking is really yummy. Ten: my dad calls to ask if my mom’s still going to her AA meetings. I tell him yes, even though I don’t know what AA stands for and Mom hasn’t left her room in a week except to refill her drink. Ten: Dad and Mom got into a really bad fight. He left in the middle of a thunderstorm. It’s been two weeks, and we don’t know where he went.
Nine: it’s Christmas Eve. We’re at Gram’s house and the fire is burning and it’s so warm. Eight, seven, six: I’m not sure if I want to be Wonder Woman or my mom when I grow up but they’re both kinda the same so does it really matter? Five: Mom got home from work late acting funny. Daddy said she just missed a meeting and that she’d be alright in the morning. Four: my hand is held firmly on both sides while my parents swing me back and forth. The world is solid beneath my feet. I hope I can be as in love as Mommy and Daddy when I grow up. Three, two, one, zero. I wonder if while I was in my Mom’s womb she wished that I would grow up to be just like her.

Always pack a toothbrush. Your mom isn’t always going to be around to remind you
2. Treat yourself like your favourite character. You never hated her flaws, they made her perfect to you.
3. Your mother is always a viable excuse as to why you can’t go somewhere.
4. If you can’t cry in front of your partner, break up with them.
5. Learn to change the oil in your car. Your dad won’t always be around to do it for you.
6. Laughing during *** is necessary.
7. Learn to make phone calls. They ****. Your mom won’t be around to make them for you.
8. Vote for the lesser evil.
9. Your sibling(s) literally have the same DNA make up as you. Be kind to them, you never know when you might need a kidney.
10. Call your mom. She isn’t always going to be around to answer.

You see I have this problem:
I want to travel the whole entire world,
But night terrors have left me with bags under my eyes that would just
Cost me a pretty fortune to check.
At the very least, more than my plane ticket,
More likely though, the last bit of sanity I hold within my soul.
I do not carry my illness like a purse
Trust me if I could, I would.
I'd fill it with bandaids and mended memories of the times I was never brave enough
With love and strength and courage.
I'd stick it into a time machine, send it back to a littler me
But, my illness is not a purse. Not something to simply be set down when it becomes too heavy,
It's more like a backpack
Filled with rocks
And duct taped to my abdomen.
Night terrors and ghost pains have consumed my body
Leaving me standing here with what feels like
A fifty pound weight
Holding me down.

I always wondered how many times
I could call you
before you wouldn't pick up

I used to test it
I'd call when I woke up
good morning beautiful
A call before bed
goodnight darling
Once when I was drunk
im so in love with you it hurts, will you marry me?
Another time when I found out someone was dead.
it hurts

I'd call at 2am
(just to ask if you were dreaming of me)
Once at 4:44 in the afternoon
(so you could share the time with me)
And once at midnight
(can you see the moon? I'm thinking of you)

Somehow without fail
You always managed to pick up
On the 3rd ring.
Ring.
Ring.

Until you didn't.
One day it was the fourth,
sorry I was cleaning, baby
The next the fifth
i didn't hear my phone
Until finally
You just didn't answer.

I'd always wondered
What the answer to my question was.
I was never prepared
To find it hand in hand with pain
In the sound of a dial tone.

"You killed a man"
They say over and over
In his head
"You killed a man."
They repeat to him
Until he knows they cannot
Be wrong.

He walks the streets
wondering if the eyes that glance him over
while they walk on by
know that on average
a person walks past a murderer
36 times
in their life.
"You killed a man"
He expects one of them to scream.

She is different
He knows this from they day they first meet
The voices go quiet
Almost allowing him to sleep.

He takes her on dates,
tells her
his hopes and dreams
though it is not until the night
they decide to combine their resources
in a cramped damp apartment
with a view of the sunset against the skyline
that he decides to tell her
the words that once were on
replay
inside his mind.

"I killed a man."
He whispers to her.
His voice bright
In direct contrast to the darkness
of the night.

As his hands tap the covers
Twice then once then twice again.

Her eyes caress him,
touching him in ways he knows can not be done
with hands
as he repeats
"I killed a man."
His eyes fixed on the ceiling,
Counting the tiles
To be sure
that 101
has not changed to 102
and the stain in the 81'st hasn't shifted to 22'nd.

He jumps at the feeling of her touch

Voice sharp
Hands soft.
"Tell me."
The demand
so quiet
he wonders if it was just the sound
of settling dust.

He turns to her,
Finds the question in her eyes.
It's a drastic change
from the haunted look he expected
if only to reflect
what he sees in the mirror every day.

"I killed a man." He says once again,
For the millionth time in his life
though only
the third
outside of his head.

Her fingers trace his face.
Thumb running across his lips.
She opens her mouth,
and quietly whispers the words he never dared to
even consider a possibility

"They were wrong."

.

I was asked
If I believed in a god
And when I shook my head
Asked why not?
And that got me thinking,
Why not?

It's quite simple really.

I only see my brother
On very rare occasions
And I've lost my mother to her lover
A man named Merlot.

But I'm not the only child who lives this life.
Jose and Jack
Invade far too many homes
With promises of turning the clock back.
But I only know my story
And how God didn't step in

Two years ago I thought about killing myself
And if I had to write a list of 21 reasons I got there?
Six of them would be days the rain came down too hard for me to be seen,
Five for the amount of park benches I slept on before I learned how to ask for help
Four, for the number of times her hand should have been awarded a speeding ticket for racing across my face
Three for the friends I watched lowered into the ground
Two times I was left curled into a ball wishing I knew why he thought it was okay to take such an intimate part of me
And
One time that she told me that she never raised a ****.

In comparison it's sad
The list that kept me here.
Really, it's the number three.
One for the teacher who told me I wasn't alright.
One for the girl who stood by me and held me in a parking lot while I cried
The last for the boy who's birthday is forever inked
Into my left arm.

These are things I'll never let be seen.
The simple fact is
It's much easier to smile and laugh
Than to curl up
And ask

Why?

It's easier to say yes
Than to say no
Easier to give every part of myself, trying to help
Than cut the toxic out of my life
Or preserve the positive.
That's just something ingrained into me.
I'm pushing
   and pushing
Because you see, I'm in the habit of full force shoving
(people right out of my life.)
Though I'm not sure where I got it from
Maybe it was my mother
When she thought it would be easier
To send me away
Than take a look at what my brother and I were trying to say.
In the end though,
This trait is a ***** dark part of me
That screams to be fixed.
There's nothing more to it.

So when I'm asked
If I think there's a god
I'll just smile soft
Shake my head
And go on with my day.
Because it's easier than asking
How could He leave us this way?