If this is what failure looks like, then it’s not such an ugly picture.

Her hair is sticking up all over the place, makeup is smudged around her eyes, or maybe it’s just dark circles from sleepless, toss-and-turn nights waiting for me.

Yeah, right.

“Been taking good care of yourself, I see.” Talking to her hasn’t always been like smoke signals in the dark. Once we spoke the same language, inscribed from an alphabet no one else understood.

She exhales and I swear I can hear cigarette ashes grinding in her throat. One eyebrow raises and a puff of smoke escapes lips I pray are chapped from the cold. Before she replies, empires rise and fall, the oceans erode a new continent; perhaps the entire ******* human race is gone.

“You’re not exactly the picture of health either, sweetheart.”

Her sarcasm is like a comma, and I learned to read long enough ago that I don’t really see it, but I understand its weight. Reliefreliefrelief rushes through me fast enough to make my head spin, a bit like swallowing the first sip of *****; painful. But no so much so that I couldn’t see getting used to it, eventually.

The future looks like nicotine kisses and nights where one of us whispers, “I’m lost, lostlostlost.” and one of us replies “Look up, please, look up. You’re home.”

She smiles and I realize I’m as close to forgiven as I’ll ever get this time around.