i was smoking on the balcony earlier
the sun still refusing to set
birds chirping
mosquitoes biting
someone in the neighborhood throwing a party
in all its simplicity, and maybe due to it,
the setting made me tear up:

roughly three years ago,
i cried on that balcony at night
for hours and hours
i was fixing to die but so scared of the thought
i never wrote a letter either;

roughly two years ago,
i was on that balcony grinning like hell,
my insides felt ablaze because
you were on the other end of the phonecall
and you were saying you loved me
and the tear stains had quite dried up by then;

roughly a year ago,
i was on that balcony biting my lips to blood,
because i'd realized i had a crush on you
and knew i was only a friend
my head swarming with thoughts of guilt
and i could not remember smiling at the sound of your voice
without the sting of feeling like a criminal;

now, we are set to meet in three days
it's no big deal
we still are not okay
but gods, i have been bleeding for so long it's starting to feel comfortable
we are adults
and we're spending three days by the sea
like adults
it's going to be awkward,
and i'm going to get blind drunk
and i'm going to be pathetic
and i'm going to beg
and i'm going to cry
and you're going to cry
and you're going to apologize
and you're going to be petty
and you're going to get blind drunk
and it's going to be awkward,
but we're adults
and i can manage;

so i was smoking on the balcony,
the sun quite close to going home
the sky as colorful as drug-induced insomnias
and even though i have three years' worth of bitter memories,
i was alive to see a fourth
i am alive
and it's not easy, and it's not pleasing, and it's not great,
but it is good enough.

you loved saying you love me

in the lonely mornings, when we were hundreds of miles away; in the rare, rare mornings when we were mere inches away - you’d say “i love you” instead of “good morning”, instead of “how’d you sleep”, instead of “let’s get breakfast”, and it felt natural, and i can’t say either anymore, and my friends think it was you who made me this rude but i see nothing casual in any word you’ve ever used

in the lonely evenings, when we were at different parties at different parts of the country; in the extremely rare evenings when we were watching a movie in my bed or in your bed - you’d say “i love you” instead of “try not to drink too much”, instead of “this movie is great”, instead of “i’m sleepy, good night”, and it felt so ******* natural, and i can’t say either anymore

you betrayed me, you ****** me over, lured me into trusting you so that now i can’t trust the barista at the coffee house i visit when they tell me the price of my drink

i used to be eloquent and i used to tell everyone what was on my mind and i used to never stop talking, now i shrug, i sigh, i walk past people because why would i say hello when it meant i love you coming from you, and i can’t love anymore, and saying hello would make me a liar and i don’t want to hurt people the way you hurt me

and i betrayed you, i ****** you over, lured you into trusting me so that now you probably can’t say you love your friends in fear they would want something more too

in those evenings, i’d say “i love you” instead of “i want to take off your clothes”, instead of “never leave me alone”, instead of “my body needs your body more than oxygen”, and i felt guilty as hell, because it sounded innocent but i have always been a monster, slick, sneaky, waiting to attack, and i don’t say any of these anymore, i just take what i want from people, and my friends think it was you who made me fear expressing my emotions but i no longer have such

in those mornings, i’d say “i love you” instead of “please kiss me”, instead of “i already miss you”, instead of “i can’t stop thinking about you”, and i felt  disgusting as hell, and i don’t say any of these anymore

i hated saying i love you

i rarely meet people that match me?
not that you really did
but us, we almost fit
(weird using "us", innit)
we shared so many interests
it was quite easy to pretend we shared them all
and seeing you excited,
i could just get excited for you
and vice versa

my life-line
is divided
by two fainter, thinner lines
almost perpendicular to it
on both my palms
i supposed one of them stands for the attempt
but prior to last summer,
i couldn't guess what was the purpose of the other
- now,
my life is divided
by prior-to- and post-
the whole disaster that divided me-and-you
(it's weird not using "us", innit)
prior-to-thatonedaylastjuly,
whenever i was happy,
i had so many people online but gods,
it was always you
(when i was not so happy, too)

post-thatonedaylastjuly,
i have so many people online but gods,
most of them only share a fraction of my heart
(not that i can pretend it's whole,
or that it ever could begin to be,
because who has that much glue to begin with)
and i can talk to v about queer rights,
and i can talk to k about sad nights,
and i can talk to j about comics or recipes or my cat just did that thing,
and i can talk to a about dysphoria,
and i can talk to m about that show about the boys with swords,
BUT NONE OF THEM ARE AS EXCITED
AND NONE OF THEM FEEL QUITE AS SAFE
BECAUSE YOU KNOW I GET TOO EASILY DISTRACTED
AND IF I CHANGE THE TOPIC IT WOULD GET SO AWKWARD,
GODS,

i wish i didn't miss you
then maybe we could make attempts at being friends again
and maybe i could text you on account of something silly at, like, two am
but see, i can't
because you know i get too easily distracted,
and if i change the topic it would just get real ******* awkward
and i can not account for my past-midnight ramblings
in a post-thatonedaylastjuly world, in a post-youleavingme life