in a requiem

It was too much.  I was buckling under the weight of my deception.  And there was no stopping it anymore.  Fate had decided what it wanted and I had to follow suite.  It just wasn’t you.  I tried, hard, to pretend it was.  Hoping that pretending would turn into reality and everything would be okay, and there would be a ‘happily ever after’ with a white picket fence and a diamond ring.  But it only suffocated me.  You left with good intentions…but you know what they say about the road to hell.

Suddenly I was all alone.  More alone than usual because you were gone.  Trying to make things better for us.  Trying to make things better for you.  And trying to be the man you thought I wanted.  Make the money you thought I needed.  Do something with your life so you could feel content.  But, fate tried to give us a chance and you ignored it.  Keeping me here, increasing my dependency on you while the distance between us stayed the same. 

I made new friends at the job you got for me here, instead of letting me move to you.  And for the first time in seven years, I didn’t want to leave.  You were reassuring and then you were moving up and losing time and I was further away from you but not really alone.

And then he zeroed in.  You knew it, too.  Because I told you when I was worried it was crossing the line from nice to ‘interested,’ but you weren’t worried.  Because we loveeach other.  But as the phone calls became less frequent and the time between visits grew longer…I reveled in the attention I received.  The attention I received without sarcasm and playful jibes.  It was simply friendly and innocent.  But it was nice.  It was nice to be noticed.

But, what transpired that fateful for night when too much Everclear and Bacardi 151 was consumed was not the plan.  Maybe it was his plan, but it certainly wasn’t mine.  Because I did love you, and although I was slowly starting to dread the inevitable shift from here to there, I wanted to be with you.  And you forgave me too easily.  And all I felt was crushing guilt.  I stayed as far away from him as I could. 

But not for very long.  I am not lying when I said I wasn’t interested in him when this started.  I am not lying when I say there were no feelings involved in the beginning.  My curiosity peaked as I tried to figure out what type of person he was.  So I let him come over and apologize for making such a mess of my life and my relationship.  And then I let him come over again and again and again…and we talked.  Mostly about me. 

But then he started to open up.  Not that there was much to open up about.  And I started to feel empathy.  Which was probably the beginning of the end.  It started to matter less and less that you didn’t have time to call or come.  It started to inconvenience me when you did.  And then I started to make up reasons that I couldn’t talk…but I was talking to him.  But then I was sharing things I wasn’t sharing with you.  And he was starting to open up more.  And then I was done.

I was starting to fall for him…and every time we spoke my stomach clenched and my chest got tight.  And I kept smiling.  And I kept making plans.  Hoping the entire time that if I kept faking it eventually it would be true.  But it just wasn’t. 

The heart wants what it wants.  And it just didn’t want you anymore.  As much as I wanted it to, because we’d been together for years.  We’d built, destroyed and rebuilt a life together.  We had plans for the future.  We had cellphones together.  I was in an apartment you refused to let me give up that I’d never be able to afford without your help.  You could feel you were losing me, too.  Pushing harder for me to come there.  Hinting more at marriage, even though only a few months prior you just ‘weren’t ready.’ 

And I just couldn’t keep lying and pretending.  Or denying what I felt.

So I’m sorry.  I’m sorry that you were trying to do what was best for us and I ruined it.  I’m sorry that I had to break your heart again.  I’m sorry you think I’m the only one for you when I had been seriously doubting you were the only for me for months now.  I’m sorry that it was a self-fulfilling prophecy.  You said you didn’t think you made me happy enough on more than one occasion.  You said maybe we shouldn’t be together because you just weren’t enough for me. 

Well, maybe you were right.

It’s out of my hands now.  This thing that’s happening between me and him can’t be stopped and I couldn’t ignore it anymore.  Only time will tell how this story ends, but all that I can do is follow my heart and ride out whatever plan fate has.

Do you remember when you were younger and you used to ask for the most ridiculous things for Christmas?  A toy that you already had, only the one all over TV was way better than your old one…simply because it was brand new?  And you were so damn excited when you opened your present on Christmas morning and it was EXACTLY what you begged your mom for?

And how long would you play with that new toy, trying to figure out?  Months?  Weeks?  Days?  Eventually, it loses it’s ‘new toy’ smell.  You’ve played with all the new features, you’ve discovered all it’s secrets and then you look back at the familiarity of your favorite toy and wonder why you ever thought you could replace it with something new and shiny.

To the “other man,” I’d like to say that’s all you are.  A shiny new thing to brighten the day and pass the boredom.  Well, at times, more than that.  But essentially, when you break it down, that’s all you can ever really be.

There are a lot of reasons why you and I would never work.  First being the man I have loved for the last six years of my life.  Things haven’t always been great between us, especially now that we’re a few hundred miles apart.  That’s probably how you landed on the radar at all.  But at the end of the day, he’s the one that gets all my jokes.  He’s the one that knows how to calm me down from an anxiety attack.  He’s the one that takes me to the store when my cramps are so bad I can hardly walk.  And he offers to take me to the Twilight movies when no one else can go because he knows I want to see it.  He’s the first person I call when I wake up from a nightmare and the first person I want to call when I have good news. 

Of course, all of that is subjective considering I managed to hook up with you one night after several shots of Bacardi 151 and a few drinks mixed with Everclear…but that’s beside the point.

Secondly, you are a self-proclaimed ‘people pleaser.’ The more I get to know you the more I noticed that people really walk all over you.  I can’t stand that.  Weakness so blatant in a person disgusts me.  There’s a line between between being nice and being a doormat, and you straddle it constantly.  I hope that our friendship will at least teach you how to have a backbone and look out for yourself a little more.  Now, I’m not necessarily selfish all the time, but I can take care of myself.  I pride myself on my ’take no shit’ attitude, and given the opprotunity, I would inadvertently destroy you.  You probably wouldn’t believe it, since you always see the glass as half full…but I can tell.  I can hear the disappointment in your voice you don’t know how to hide.  And see it in the way your head slightly drops.  This happens when you don’t quite get the reaction you hope from me when you tell me a story or share some exciting news.  I would crush your soul.  Not on purpose, hopefully, but it would happen.

You are just too young, and I don’t mean in age.  You’re niave and fairly innocent.  I would corrupt you.  If I let you into my world, really, and not just share the fun anecdotal stories that I tell you, you would probably become jaded.  I’m not really a bad person, but I mean it when I say I’m not necessarily a good one either.  The you I see is a genuinely nice person and you don’t need to be dragged down by someone who finds the negative in everything.

But finally, I’m bored.  It’s clear to me that you don’t want me to get close to you, which I guess is lucky for me.  I am already getting pulled in by the mystery of ‘who is this guy, really,’ and the empathy I have for a person who has a difficult time making friends…but the way you evade has gone from interesting to to annoying.  The new toy smell is wearing off.

The guilt threatens to drown me
Weighing heavy on my chest
I’m gasping for air—suffocating
Choking on my lies and desperate pleas
Losing my head above your wake

Something had to give—let go
You can’t save me this time
With my limbs thrashing wildly
Threatening to pull us both under
I can’t be your anchor anymore

Release me and I’ll sink to the bottom
You can catch the current and float
I’m a natural disaster waiting to flood
Eye on the shore—your feet in the sand
Every man for himself to weather the storm

…that akward moment when you realize that no matter how adamant you are about NEVER EVER writing a love triangle into your future novel, you still manage to find YOURSELF in the middle of one.

My new 5 year plan is to get invited to comic con.

Now, I just need an idea….

Music pumped loudly throught he speakers and the entire room shook with the pulse of the bass.  Layers of people ground against each other, mostly off beat.  Petra stood in the back of the room looking out into the endless abyss of dancing teenagers. 

Her vision began to blur and shake in time with the music.  The hair on her neck matted with sweat.  Her stomach rolled and she steadied herself.  Pushing her way through dirty dancing couples, she reached the front door.  Head pounding and breath shortening, she pushed open the door.

Instead of fresh air, she was met with a cloud of smoke from the kids getting their nicotine fix out in the yard.  She doubled over as the smell made ever muscle in her body lurch.  Her dark red hair fell over her face in sweaty tangles.  A hand met her back and pushed her forward.  Failing to root herself down, she started to move. 

“You’ve been a real thorn in my side, you know that.”  The voice pushed her hard before letting out a deep, masculine chuckle.

She tried to reply, but the words got caught in her throat.  Something wasn’t right.  Panic elevated her heartbeat as wrongness of the situation worked it’s way through her nervous system.  She’d been drugged.

She fucking knew it.

He reached out and grabbed a handful of hair, yanking it away from her face until she looked up at him.  Her eyes lolled back as a dull pain started to register in her brain.  The words were still getting stuck, making it hard for her to breathe.  She heaved forward.

“If you puke on me, it will be the last thing you ever do.”  His palm hit her left cheek so hard she fell backward.

Petra tried to push herself back up, but her arms wouldn’t move.  She wondered what he’d slipped her and how long before she’d have control of her own body.  She tried to see past him to make out how far away from the house.  Somebody had to have seen them.  Somebody would know she wouldn’t go anywhere with him.

Sooner or later, somebody would stop minding their own business and come make sure everything is okay.

And things were most certianly not okay.

He crouched down next to her and whispered something she couldn’t understand into her ear.

“Sam!”

“Ryan, you better stay the fuck out of this.  This is between me and that bitch.”  Sam spit, most of it landing Petra’s face.

She couldn’t even wipe it off.

“Are you insane,”  Ryan yelled.  He stepped between them.

Her eyelids became heavy and she fought hard to keep them open.

The two boys argued.  Behind Ryan’s stiff figure, she could only see Sam’s arms flailing wildly.  Petra’s mind focused on gaining control of her muscles, making it hard for her to hear what was being said.  She could feel her arm twitch and reached up to wipe her face.

It turned out to be a hard slap.  Ryan’s head jerked back at the sound and Sam used the distraction to launch an assualt on him.  Sam’s fist connected with Ryan’s jaw and left ear before he could react.  The fight garnered the attention of the smokers on porch and the wayward partiers.  A crowd began to form.

She shut her eyes tight as her vision blurred completely.  The sound of skin hitting skin and knuckles grazing bone reverberated through her head.  Somebody got hit in the nose, the sound of the crunch echoed in her ear drums.  She turned on her side and threw up from the intensity of the noise.

“Pet!” 

She knew it was her name, but it reminded her of the sound water hitting water makes when you’re immersed.

She opened her eyes.

“Pet?” 

She knew the voice, but she couldn’t hold on to it.  Her eyes closed again and she felt her body move.  It felt like floating down the current.  She tried to open her eyes, but the motion made her head spin.  Her nostrils flared as they entered a cloud of cigarette smoke. 

Her eyes opened and she was sitting on the porch.  People were still watching watch Sam and Ryan pound each other’s face in.  Her head nodded to the side and she came face to face with the person who had carried her.

He held up a bottle of water with a straw in and told her to drink.

“Jordan?”  The words felt foreign on her tongue and sounded wrong.

“Just drink,” He replied.  His eyes were trained on the crowd of people.  He leaned forward and strained to hear the fight. 

There was cheering and then Ryan pushed his way out.  He made his way over to her and Jordan, his eye already swelling.  A bruise was starting to form alongside his jaw.  Petra kept sucking water through the straw, wishing she’d just be able to leave.

“We need to go,” he barked.  Lifting up his t-shirt, he wiped the blood that was starting to dry under his nose.

Jordan wrapped his arm around Petra and lifted her left side while Ryan mirrored his motions on her right.

“This party sucks,” Petra whispered as her head rolled forward.

“Yeah, it really does,” Ryan sighed.

They loaded her into the back of Ryan’s Charger and peeled out of the driveway.  Petra closed her eyes as her cheek pressed against the window.

When she opened them, she was greeted with the bright white sterlization of a hospital and the worst headache she’d ever had in her life.

Thinking about doing NaNoWriMo this year.  (more like, every year for the last 3, but who’s counting.)  Coming of age story I’m working on.  (more like, thinking about working on.)

She was the sun and he was the moon.
Planets apart and miles to go,
Always in orbit, never in tune.
He covered the sea in his soft glow,
She rose brightly, high above the dunes.
Two lonely souls searching for a mate,
Dreaming of love—relying on faith.

Living in stars, he plays with the tides,
Silently watching the passing ships.
Still, he dreams of magic carpet rides,
And young lovers touching lip to lip,
Illuminated by their soft sighs.
Content to sleep, the moon starts to dip.
He is gone when night fades to day,
Not knowing the warmth she gives away.

She turns, to rainbows, young lovers’ tears,
While imagining her own suitor’s smile.
Though her loneliness consumes her fears,
The sun will always shine through her trials.
She longs to be complete when he’s near,
And, feeling hope, she lingers awhile.
The stars align, the sun and moon wait
For an eclipse they know is their fate.

Now she is his sun and he, her moon.
A galaxy of love is set free
With one orbit, forever in tune.
He waxes and wanes with joyful ease,
She rises and sets with sweet swoon.
One is the lock, the other the key:
Unmatched, in a universe so great.
Twin souls, supernatural mates.

A piece I wrote for my childhood bestfriend and her fiance.  They have matching sun and moon tattoos. 

I’m pressed against the glass,
A sick voyeur waiting for the action.
Watching as you line yourself with dynamite
Again and again and again.
I thought I held the detonator,
That I was in control
Of you, of us, of this.
Every second counting down
Thinking I could stop it
Save you.
But now you’ve lit the wick.
I can’t risk being your collateral damage.
I can’t watch you self destruct.
Anticipation building.
Tick
Addiction growing.
Tick
Disregard multiplying.
Tick
Climax escalating.
Boom
Nothing left in the aftermath.
Burned egos, shattered promises
I’m a spectator of your cruel sport.
Broken hopes, annihilated dreams
I couldn’t help you reconstruct.

I’ve been thinking about the person I wrote this about more than usual lately.  Most likely becaues this person just had a birthday and since I don’t have much to do lately but sit around and feel disgustingly nostaligic about everything.  I also just wrote a poem to read at my childhood bestfriend’s wedding next week, and whenever I write something new, I look back on all the old shit that sits around the internets collecting metaphorical dust.