maybe i never had the right words.
maybe that is the true problem.
maybe it was that i could never say everything that you needed to hear.

let me tell you a story.

when i was eight, my family always got together on christmas to exchange gifts.
my family is bursting at the seams, with aunts and uncles and grandparents and
second cousins and my aunt’s stepmother’s adopted niece and
everyone crams into one house, around one tree.
we do a name draw at thanksgiving, and everyone buys one present to give to one person.
i wasn’t supposed to open my present until everyone was together,
but i did.
and i was so embarrassed, at eight years old, to have broken the rules,
even though no one cared at all.
it was a tea set.
small, perfect for an eight year old, with cups and spoons and plates and a dish for the sugar.
i never could look at that tea set without feeling guilt,
and when it finally broke, i was relieved.
it had been picked out for me by a cousin of mine, and i thought that it was beautiful,
but i broke the rules.
now, on christmas, even though we no longer get together with all of my family to give gifts,
i still make sure that i am in line,
that i am not breaking any rules at all.

on christmas this year, i tried to sleep in and avoid thinking of you,
because you were going to be talking with your family,
and sierra was going to be talking to isaac,
and i was so unbelievably jealous.
and i wanted to drive over to your house and demand to see you,
but that would be breaking the rules, and besides that,
it wasn’t my place.  
christmas is for family, after all. not for old friends who are young and foolish still.

that night, i went and saw the third hobbit movie,
and i cried and kept crying.
i picked one dwarf, the one played by aidan turner who is gorgeous and great,
and i asked that he live.
and then the elf girlfriend played by kate from lost was there and i just broke down.
because they were perfect and not supposed to work out,
and they wanted to break the rules but some rules you cannot break.
yes, i am foolish.
i know that.
yes, i cried over the pain of a fictional elf when she asked for the love to be taken away,
because it hurt too much to bear.

but if there is one thing that i have learned in all of life as a foolish person,
it is this:
you take what is unbearable,
and you bear it.

there are no other options.

even though this love i hold for you is painful and sometimes makes it hard to breathe,
i will bear it, and i will learn to accept heartbreak as a part of this life.

it is valentine’s day on saturday, and i want so badly to have someone to hold me,
because yes, it is a stupid holiday, but genuine affection is not,
and i miss that.
i’ve never had it but i miss it.
isn’t that strange?

but it is possible, apparently, and it does not stop hurting.
i wish to have this love taken from me, i wish to see you replaced in my heart,
but i will take what is unbearable,
and i will bear it.

sometimes, in highly inappropriate moments,
like when i am at church or driving or watching a movie with my sisters,
your hands ghost over me and my blood turns to fire again.
i can feel the little circles rubbed on my arm with a surprising tenderness,
i can feel legs twisted up with mine,
i can feel soft lips against my neck and a voracious appetite at my jawline.
goosebumps spread up my body as my toes curl and my face flushes,
and i remember all too well.

i am the worst sort of person for what i want to do to you.
the things that i want scare me.
i scare myself.
i want you.
i want you in the worst ways.

i want to dance around in the kitchen with you,
humming a song we both know.
i want the feeling of your hand on my waist,
my head on your chest,
feeling your voice through your shirt.

i want to curl up with you and watch the greatest sausage fest in the history of ever,
the hobbit,
and to laugh with you,
because those movies made me cry,
just like you have.

i want to hand you a mixed cd for your car that is entirely too honest.
i want you to call me at some point to talk about it.
i want you to respond in kind.

i want you to braid my hair,
to gently untangle my many knots with a brush,
and then to run your fingers through it and to tell me that it feels like silk.

i want to stay up way too late sitting next to you,
talking about everything and nothing,
and to fall asleep tucked under your arm.

i want to wake up and to watch the way that you breathe when i’m with you.

i am a dangerous person,
and the things that i want terrify me.

nothing will ever come from my demented fantasies,
so i would like to ask you very politely to leave my head alone,
because you are on my mind all the time
and that’s a dangerous perch for someone such as you,
and it’s even worse for me.

did you know
that heartbreak can actually **** you?
i don’t mean suicide,
even though that is true and terrible as well.
i mean that there is actual, physical pain from heartbreak.
it is a stress induced apparent heart attack, but it is not a heart attack.
i thank you for not breaking my heart.
you hurt me, yes,
past, present, and maybe even future pain
is expected to move in from your general direction.
i am preparing for that possibility.
i think about my grandmother though,
who was with my grandfather before the war, and after for a brief moment,
who married another man,
who raised two children with that man,
who divorced her husband for a mutual lack of being “in love”,
and who finally married my grandfather.
there was no lack of being “in love” for them,
but when he died,
she carried on.
she did not allow the absence of a loved one to pull her from this world.
both of my great grandmothers are still alive, decades after their husbands passed away.

the women of my line are made of steel.
we are pretty, we are delicate,
we are smart, we are clever with our words,
and we endure.  
we are strong.  we survive.

so i will rely on the strength of my mothers
and i will not let the pain i feel distract me from who i am
or what i want to do.
i will be strong like my grandmothers.
when i feel the heartbreak,
i will let it hurt, and i will move on.

the women of my line are made of steel.

so am i.

sometimes i watch
the way that smoke curls up
from a lighted cigarette
and i want to hold it in my hands and
curl my lips around it
like the indie rocker boy
who’s been staring at my friend from the corner.
but the tar burns my lungs
and i am too vain for yellow teeth and yellow fingertips
and yellow eyes and black organs.
i miss the way that you paid attention to me.
you would be humming and
pretending to be working and
i would say one word and
you would stop pretending and listen.
unless you had your guitar out.
nothing could come between you and your music
and i could never come between you and her
so i never even tried.
coming in second was never really my style,
you know that.
so i watched you watch me watch you feeling the music
until you gave up trying to read my mind and
told me yours with the chords you played
and i miss that.
i miss the organized chaos that erupted from your fingertips
that were not yellow like indie rocker’s
who is now hitting on my friend
because you always said that
smoking was for losers,
which is probably right
if indie rocker is anything to go by.
he’s nodding my friend away to a corner
and we all know how the night will end.
i will have to interject and bring her home
and he will scowl at me
because she is the prettiest girl in the room
and no one can take their eyes off of her.
she’s lovely in the way i always wanted to be
but never could attain
and i guess that i’ll just wait
for another heartbroken punk kid who
needs a shoulder to cry on.
he’s usually indie rocker’s friend
and he always wants to smoke.
and it’s going to be two in the morning soon
and i am sitting here in this place
thinking about someone who already left me.