She stood then and looked back at the computer on her desk. Her connection to a world she's lost. She decided then that wanted him only for the satisfaction that a young one feels when they win against an opponent in feild games. He was her peer, emotionally at least. In age, he was always beyond her reach just slightly. She remembered trying to cath the hem of his shirt as his life raced ahead. Trying just to catch a ride with him. She was fated to pretend her own life was going somewhere, racing off towards some distant horizon. But there was no one on the hem or her coat, so truly she had no measure of her aging.
The only way to count it is by the moments she wished defined her. Birth, loss of innocence, and finally-Death. She has lusted for it, yes.
She pours herself a glass of water.Her red eyes seem to fall from her head into the cup, distortion of reality is her only release. She finds it in the bowl of her pipe, in the resin left on her ring finger. Her salvation can be purchased as a twenty sack.
She finds him often in the darkness, hovering just above her. She reaches out to her celing, hope sinking as arm rises.
"Are you there?" She will as the air around her, ask as she shifts off to sleep. Her salvation can also be bought by exhaustion.
In her dreams, he's one of changing shadows. A presence, constant and shallow. She has never asked the shadow his name, she doesn't want to know.
She is content in the waking world, her bright and happy world. It's only when the night comes that she wishes to run, to beat her opponent. To raise the flag above her head and beam in victory.
Salvation comes to her with the coming light, be it from her lighter, the sun, or the lamp beside her bed.