there is a lot of film and tv with dances where the main character is devastated by the slow dance, but ends up with the right person, or perhaps they gets pulled onto the floor and everything is right, the music, the stars
i forgot life was neither and when the lights dimmed at prom as a slow song came on i was forming blisters as the person who would later threaten to slit his wrists for breaking up with him was nowhere to be seen
the nail in the coffin of that night as i gazed at him with her and wondered why he’d even asked me to a dance he mostly ignored me at
i was surrounded by people, young and in love as the song dragged on, much like the night would with him
swallowed up by his tongue and his hands

when he was good it was okay and when it was bad it was terrible
every time i asked for below the minimum he would argue i didn’t tell him how much it meant to me, to be asked out in person, to be asked to prom like everyone else (even if it was blatantly obvious and embarrassing)

people cheered for me when we started dating
they would never know about the night he threatened to **** himself
how he cornered me for information after i drunkenly said i wasn’t totally clean after we’d broken up
how i cried after that interrogation and was so close to jumping off the deck, wishing i was dead
how it felt to be a truly evil person for no reasons other than the bitter complaints he spit out of his mouth
they wouldn’t see me break down when asked if i was okay
they wouldn’t know how i stared at the ceiling of that cabin as tears ran down my eyes, too tired to sob anymore
how i fell asleep after the exhaustion took over

they didn’t know how bad it would get
and neither did i