It’s on nights like these I know you still live on my shelves.
These words hurt to write because they don’t fit into the story that I want to have, in which I’m over you and am changing into someone better than before.

Nights like these remind me that I still love you,
that I still try and push my way towards you.
Try to push into your heart, and into your hands.

These nights remind me that I still want to hold you,
that I still want to lose my voice playing Mario Kart and fall asleep next to you.

I destroyed all I have of you,
and you’re sticking around, like the glue of stickers on the windows of a car.
Thinking of you on these nights makes my throat close and my heart hurt,
it makes my hands reluctant to write these words. I don’t want to look back in the morning and see proof of my weakness compared to you.

I think I once called you a flower, pushing through the crust of the Earth to bloom.
I still see this flower behind closed eyes when I dream, as much as I don’t want to.

The last thing I want to do is push you away,
as much as it’s the only thing I want, to keep you from stomping on me even further.
How do I keep you close to me with all the distance between us?

Do you know what you’re doing to me still?
Every laugh and smile is like salt in the wound, but it’s like I’m starving for your company.

I hate nights like these
because I remember the way your hands shook that day, but also the way you didn’t cry.

I hate nights like these
because you push my mind in so many different directions that I can’t recognize myself in the mirror in the morning.

Most of all, nights like these remind me that you aren’t feeling this.
This heaviness that comes in the dark, inescapable.
I can't see it in your eyes.