what do you do when you never knew life without it? when i am not what happened, but who would i be without it? when theres a certain pleasure to every drop of pain? i will always be rolling under waves of whiskey and wondering what the world looked like through these same eyes before. i tell my psychiatrist “when i spill red wine, i always see what could have been, what’s that mean doc?” but he only ever nods and scribbles a new prescription for another bottle of the same merlot no matter how many times i tell him that it tastes just like when i was seven and my mother tucked me in. i drink it anyways, of course, because i want to feel seven again until i’m back under the quilt my grandma made me with a hand over my mouth. i live here now, in this space between me and everything i've ever known. its not here that it happened, but its here that i remain.