She said to me, she said,
“What happened, you use to laugh.”

And I came back,

“That was before the aftermath of depressive spats tackled head-on. Before I developed a habit of asking what’s wrong for every sad face I see, before I tried listening because no one ever heard me, and it was terrible.”

And I got an earful of awful sounding words.

“You took their hurt, but what’s that worth when it’s tearing you up inside? When every night you struggle to say goodbye to faces long gone, and you just have to carry on like nothing’s wrong? I can hear it in your voice now, the spark is gone.”

And I said,

“No one’s perfect, but for for what it’s worth I’d do it all again. And maybe that’s because I miss them all so much, my dear friends who never heard the meaning in my words..We all hurt, but I’ll take it all in for them, again and again. And if my laughter is reduced to a smirk well then, I’d say that’s a small price to pay in the end.”