it's nights like these that i miss you,
i miss you more than i've missed anyone.
against all odds and against what fate had in store,
you walked into my life and flipped around my insides.
[at least that's what it feels like when i hear your name.]

it's nights like these that i love you,
i love you more than i ever, ever should.
against my own good sense and against your wishes,
i will carry a piece of you with me, tangled in my insides.
[at least that's what it feels like when i see your face.]

you're the only one i can converse with in other's words,
words like, "if i could i would shrink myself and sink
through your skin to your blood cells and remove
whatever makes you hurt but i am too weak
to be your cure."

words like, "you are the smell before rain.
you are the blood in my veins.
call me a safe bet. i'm betting i'm not.
i'm glad that you can forgive. i'm only hoping....
as time goes, you can forget."

these words i could never say on my own,
so i'll rip my heart out and hand it over,
on a silver platter ringed with dandelions,
still pumping, beating, strong as can be.

and i might be nothing you want anymore,
and that's okay, because i don't want me either.
i'll find someone, someday, but they won't be you.
this is everything i never had the heart to say.

because it wouldn't have changed anything,
it was always the wrong situation, the wrong time,
the wrong girl. always.

but i loved you, i loved you.
i could never bring myself to hurt you,
but what's done is done and i can't take it back.
and i'm sorry, i'm so sorry, and this is everything,
everything i've held inside, wrapped up.

i've always had the worst timing.
i'm constantly a walking catastrophe.
but i'd clean up my act for you,
and it'd feel good doing it.

when i cross that carolina line next weekend,
don't waste another thought on me.
i won't be back, we can pretend it never happened.
need you like water in my lungs, but this is the end.

in the morning i leave for manhattan,
and you leave for jacksonville.
"you don't see stars like these just anywhere."

so just for tonight, would you mind...
if we threw our charade away,
just for tonight?

we can stop and pretend the stars are ours.
i'll point one out and call it, "octopus vulgaris".
and only you will know what it means.

please forgive me,
i know you can only say no.
i can't help myself but to ask anyway.

you're always lurking in the ******* background.
in everything i do, i wonder if i'd do it different.
and it's all your ******* fault.
and i hate you for it,  but i can thank you now, too.
what you did to me that night in march is...
nothing short of obscene, nothing short of terroristic.

and it's made me who i am today, so you live on.
in the way i smile, and laugh, and cry, and shake.
in the way i smoke, and drink, and dance, and tremble.
in the way i love, and hate, and fear, and taste.
i wish you'd just leave me the **** alone.

i see you in the mirror, in the way i can't meet my own eyes.
i see you in the scars that have faded from time.
i see you in my desire to turn myself inside out sometimes.
i see you in my desire to hug and never let go.

but mostly, i hear you.
i hear you in the way i think about people, in the way i read them.
i hear you in my thought process, about who's lying in wait...
even if there's no one there, and i know it.
i hear you in the way someone screams and i start to shake.
i hear you in the way broken promises and shattered trust sounds,
over the phone at two in the morning, in sobs and snarls.

i live, breathe, and will probably die hearing you.
but i think i'm as okay with that now as i ever will be.
so please, just. just go away.
i'm so tired of you being here.

i'm so sick of carrying you with me.
in my head, in my heart, in my body.
in my ******* soul.