Blue Fever: Act I

There's a mosquito in our room. 

Well, the room. I guess it isn't ours and maybe that's some of the problem. But it's here, buzzing around an otherwise silent landscape of cotton peaks and valleys as I adjust and readjust and try to get comfortable. I know I'm not falling asleep any time soon but maybe I can get comfortable. There's a patch of light trickling in from the other room and every so often I can see the mosquito zipping back and forth between us. I never remember to turn off the light in the room where the bar is and I think it's because I'm half-heartedly trying to get caught mid-cocktail-party-for-one. He is unaffected, both by the mosquito and by the amount of whiskey that routinely disappears overnight. If you can sleep through one, you can sleep through the other. Maybe it's no surprise everyone is asleep--this much be exhausting to watch.   

There's a mosquito in the room. The maddening part is not the buzzing that has become siren-like in the last hour, but the steady whispers underneath the shrill battle cry. I swear I can hear her talking to me. Of course it's a her. It's always a woman. And I can tell because she bites. The bite doesn't hurt so much but the poison is itchy. My veins are full of it by now, I'm sure. I can feel the heat of it surging in my bloodstream as my heart rate sprints to catch up with my racing thoughts. I could leave the room or at least watch TV to drown her out but no--tonight I think I'll listen. I'll even give her a megaphone. What does she need? What do you need, baby?

I wonder how she got in here. I always close the screen door behind me when I retreat to the back porch. I haven't gone out the front door in days. Maybe it was just the right timing. We must have done some beautifully coordinated dance, if it were visible, some extravagant choreography where I managed to get outside with coffee, cigarettes and phone all in hand and the weight of the world on my shoulders all while remembering to close the door and there she was, staying out of sight and out of mind with a singular goal of coming after me later. Maybe I just let my guard down--phone, coffee, cigarettes AND the weight of the world is a lot to juggle. 

Maybe she was here before me. 

Maybe she got here first and I'm the third wheel. 

Either way, there is a mosquito in the room. Would it be different if it were our room? How is this not waking him up? Between my endless and utterly futile attempts to settle down and settle in and her incessant fucking whispering, how is this not a bigger problem for both of us? Why am I the only one being ambushed? Is he just used to mosquitos? Better at them?

I can see the iceberg tip of his shoulder jutting out from our sea of blankets. I Titanic my way into his sharp edges for a snuggle, burying my face between his shoulder blades and tucking my knees behind his. I know it won't last long but I do this most nights when I need a hug; I just motherfucking take one, and he kind of likes it. But it gets too hot or too needy or too something and at the first sign of his discomfort I bail back to my side. Women and mosquitos first. We leave him be. 

On the old mattress there was a dip where I slept, carved out from someone else who jumped ship. I used to try to fit my knees where I thought hers went--it never really worked out. But the new mattress, our mattress, doesn't have that. And I'd like to write something nice about blank slates, but not tonight. Tonight The Mosquito has granted me an audience, and I can't be late. She's whispering. Well then, tell me your secrets. Fuck, tell me his. 

I am back in the room with the bar. Thank god I left that light on. Oh, maybe that's the real reason I do this... last call is when I say it is. When the mosquito lets me sleep. But now it's diet Dr. Pepper and whichever bottle I can reach first. Tastes like college. Tastes like home. Tastes like here. 

Are you still coming? Am I still home?

I write myself a note on the mirror. I can't wait to talk about this and I have to remember whatever this is. I'll write it here in an eyeliner I know I can't cry away. And I'll see it. And I'll know. I'm dancing around living room now. It's quiet here. My cheeks are red and I can't see into the room. I lost my glasses. I lost the mosquito. I'm writing in my head. I always am. I'm singing out loud. I usually am not. I am acting so silly now but we'll have a conversation and that will be better. I'll get better. It gets better. 

Sometimes the conversations are more important than the actions and sometimes they just... aren't. I'm back in the room. I'm out of diet Dr. Pepper. I'm tired of drinking out of the bottle. I lost my favorite glass. I erased the note on the mirror. I am embarrassed about it. I won't remember.

There are mosquitos in our room. Too many. I hope they start with my eyeballs so I don't have to watch what I'm doing to myself. 

I stretch my arms up and get them over the blanket cocoon I've swaddled myself in--I hope they go after the tattoo I am sick of looking at while they're at it. One by one I feel the mosquitoes settling in a way that I simply cannot. They sink into me and I feed into them, which invites more and more. Oh, I left the kitchen light on too. That's new. The siren-whispers are a melody now. I know this song. Fuck, I left the speaker outside. Oh well. I think this could work out. I think I can do this. It's a chorus. Ouch. They are whispering questions. In a round. Sounds pretty at first but it gets painfully repetitively. 

Why did you... Who do you think... Where did you even... How could you have... What were you... When were you last... Why didn't you... 

It's not the bite that stings, it's the poison that itches. 

It's a symphony now, a swarm. It's a cloud of tiny wings and shouted whispers of every mistake I've ever made. It's the first time I realized as a child that I wasn't invited to someone's birthday party. It's crying the entire flight from Liverpool to Chicago. It's the trail of drunken tears I left across Tampa when someone I didn't even really respect betrayed me. It's the way I can tell when I don't have someone's full attention and my insides turn into the queasy stomach I developed when I was eight years old. It's every time I had to to get on a plane when my work there wasn't even close to done. It's not having the patience sometimes. It's digging into an old notebook to be disgusted by who I was and what I was writing not but six months ago. It's that same notebook which has "be kind" written on the outside but on the inside screams "this is who you really are." It's every time I remember that I used to fight hurricanes and now the slightest summer shower ruins my trip to the grocery store and I don't leave the house for three more days. It's every last goodbye that I didn't know would be the last one. It's every book I never read, it's every bar conversation I faked my way through, it's every time I drank too much and listened to Brand New just so I could cry and try to feel something. It's that I still like Brand New. It's all the times I said maybe when I should have said no. It's the dreams I still have. It's the ambition and drive I forgot how to have. It's the dishes in the sink. It's the makeup I forgot to take off. It's wondering why they love me but being afraid to ask. Because the answer is that they really don't, because I had that chance and tossed it from the car window on the side of I-75 somewhere like the ashes of a cigarette that I didn't really want in the first place. Because of course I did. Because no one could ever love me. Not this me, not the one whispering with mosquitos at night, opening all the doors and windows and inviting all their mosquito friends. I don't even like her. It's guilt. It's shame. It's imposter syndrome. It's wanting to be seen but not wanting to be found out. It's anxiety. And it's here for me. But it's also here for me. It is so here for me.

There's a mosquito in the room. There has been a mosquito in every room, every hotel room, every his-hers-and-ours room, every space I can remember and probably the ones I don't. She's done whispering, so I think I can sleep soon. 

My sisters will ask. My Bestie will check because he knows that the day after I get a lot of mosquito bites I'm not necessarily sore but I am tender. I'll hide a few bites to keep just for myself. In a time where I am so concerned about infection rates and viral outbreaks, it's nice to have a sickness that is mine and mine alone. An invisible illness. Something I can scratch at again and again when no one is looking and not have to worry about it spreading. 

There's a mosquito in our room. I wonder if she's as tired as I am, especially on nights when I fight her so hard. I can't help but feel bad for her. 

I wonder what eats her alive at night. 

Home is where the (follow your) heart is.

I know it only takes about three minutes for the sun in India to consume your entire body and soul, but I choose to wait outside the hotel anyway. Ram ji won't be late--he never is. This is my third trip to Jaipur and my third hotel in this city, but it's mostly the same as the other ones. Everything is always marble and someone is always cleaning it. It's like they don't want me to know I'm in a dusty desert. Walls around the hotel are covered in Bougenvilla that reminds me of my grandmother every time I look at it, and they do a pretty good job of blocking out what's around me. There's new construction in the lot next door and just looking at the bamboo scaffolding that stretches eight shaky stories high makes my stomach turn.

I hear him before I see him. The engine revs and then he brakes suddenly so that the tires of the company car screech on the freshly-swept marble driveway. Ram sees me sitting on the marble steps next to security (no matter which hotel I'm at, he knows where to look for me). We make eye contact and I can see him giggle as I let out a laugh that echoes off the marble surrounding me. I grab my bag and sprint to the car before the hotel doorman can open the car door for me. The staff at The Lalit doesn't know me yet, and I don't feel like breaking them in because I'm moving to the Marriott in four days anyway, but Ram ji knows better than to try to open the door for me anymore. It took over 30 hours all said and done for me to get to the hotel, about 45 minutes to put my suitcase down and shower, and in 10 minutes I'll be in the office again. I'm home.

Follow your heart. I say "follow your heart" so much at work that people make fun of me about it. It started as a sarcastic response to people not following directions. Oh, the report is wrong? Well, follow your heart, I guess. But it morphed into meaning "you choose, you be in charge this time. I don't need to explain this to you. There's no right or wrong answer. Just follow your heart.

I celebrated my birthday a little early while I was in India. They bought me a heart-shaped cake.

Hospitality in India makes "southern hospitality" look like garbage. "Guests are gods" is a frequent saying that I hear and while it makes me feel icky, I try to let strangers and friends alike take care of me in a way that is sweet but entirely excessive. I can't drive. I can't speak the language. I'm not allowed to go anywhere by myself. I can't order a simple beer at the hotel bar without having it brought to me on a tray for no reason and presented with great pomp and circumstance, but you know what I can do? I can keep housekeeping out of my room. And they hate it. They catch me in the hallway and ask if everything is okay (it is) if I need more towels (I don't) or if I need my minibar restocked (I do, but I just need one day where I have to go get my own bottled water from downstairs, so no, thank you.) The constant aim to please is nice but the complete lack of independence is suffocating. And one time the housekeeper cleaned out my hairbrush and I still don't know how I feel about that, to be honest.

I threw the bartenders for a huge loop the second time I stayed in Jaipur. I cleared our empty glasses from the table and brought them inside while I was getting another round and they panicked. I tried explaining that I used to bartend and it's no big deal, but they tried explaining that it's their job and they are happy to serve and I don't think we got anywhere, really. I made my Indian Coworkers-Turned-Brothers explain in Hindi that I don't want a glass with my bottled beer, I don't need the over the top service, I just want to have a few drinks with friends and relax. It went okay. Two days later I was at the same hotel with the same staff and I ordered the same single beer and he brought it to me with a glass but sheepishly said, "Boss is watching, ma'am. I must bring glass but please don't use if you don't want to."

Unlearning things is hard, I get it. Especially for a bartender.

Two more days after that, I was sitting outside on the patio (mind you this was back in January, so not heatstroke weather yet, but still warm) and I watched this couple totally berate my favorite Baby Bartender because the champagne glasses weren't chilled enough. Listen, I don't care how hard you chill glasses, they have about 45 seconds OUTSIDE in INDIA before they are melting off the edge of the table, Dali style. But this guy didn't seem to get that. And he was rude to the bartender (not cool) and then was a complete dick and lied about the bartender being rude when the manager came over. I. Lost. My. Shit. Between my limited Hindi and the manager's broken English, I think we both understood that The Couple were awful people and Baby Bartender was "reprimanded" for appearances but let's all calm down and not lose our shit over hot champagne flutes.

Four months later I was back at the same hotel with the same staff and I ordered the same beer and The Manager proudly brought it to me WITHOUT a glass and smiled. "The way you like. We remember." And I was home.

We can learn. We can unlearn. We can remember.

Neither one of my parents live in a house where I was raised anymore, but I somehow live in the house I "grew up" in. It's the only house I've ever known for my whole life. It was Grandma's. Then it was Grandad's. Now it is Uncle's, but for a little while longer, it is mine. It is the place that I made a home for two sweet little boys and all that's left of them are a hole in a wall from doorknob during an intense game of hide-and-seek and one orange hula hoop. I've painted and repainted rooms. I've moved furniture and housed different kinds of orphans. And it's weird to live in a place that is home and used to be my home and very shortly will never be home again. But when I get here after long work trips or fun trips or fun work trips, it is nice to be home. (For about three days, and then I get antsy.)

Germany was the coldest. We'd just come from India, and snow fell onto my messy airplane hair as we walked into the hotel. My dad always tells this funny story about being stationed in Germany and how the windows open out and not up, so I was able to tell my Bestie who loves the cold how to let the snow into his hotel room and I swear to God I've never felt so useful.

Germany was the coldest for other reasons, darker reasons. I've tried to write about them since they happened, failing miserably each time. Here's the gist: I desperately wanted to visit a WWII concentration camp memorial site. I had NO FUCKING CLUE how traumatic it would be, but I knew I wanted to go. Bestie obliged. I think we both felt a duty to go, an obligation to the past but also an acknowledgment of our present, a window of what happens when we forget that those who look or sound or love differently than us are still human beings despite our differences.

For as long as we could, we walked around Neuengamme on the self-guided tour and Bestie watched as my empathy shattered into a thousand teardrops. He stood on the second story of the "welcome center" as I knelt on the first floor staring and weeping at the banners of names that stretched from floor to ceiling and grew exponentially as the years of the war waged on. We looked at the Book of the Dead. We saw the kilns where clay was baked into bricks and the carts that carried those bricks to the banks of the Elbe river. We read about how those kilns and carts later held only bodies.

Bestie is without a doubt one of the closest people to me and I swear to God or whatever semblance of a higher power that I felt no presence of that day, I have never been so far away from someone right goddamn next to me. We looked at each other occasionally, pointing out placards or ducking around a crumbled stone wall to reveal some new monument to tragedy. We walked and read and cried and whispered. I stared at the water for a long time. The wind was creepy. There was no one there but us. We drove through a thriving neighborhood to get there. We traveled so far to get there.

We can learn. We can unlearn. We can remember. 

Bestie and I often tell the fun story of driving down the autobahn at 200+ km/hr in a BMW i8 (it's a funny story how we even got that car, actually) when we talk about Germany. And I think we both try to tell our Neuengamme stories in ways that we have found words for. But I think it's important to note how both of those stories happened on the same day, and maybe that's why we drove so fucking fast--to get away from that horrible place. We just wanted to go home.

I called Lover that night from across the world, although I don't know if he was Lover proper at that time (what is time?) but I remember wanting the warmth of his voice above all else. Try as he might, it took me months to warm back up again.

I think Austin, TX was the hottest. I abandoned makeup that weekend because we walked everywhere and it just melted off my face. There were too many mosh pits and crowded sidewalks and steamy bars for me to give a damn what my face looked like. And the only person whose opinion I gave any fucks about was with me and like I said, he gave negative fucks. I remember (vaguely) seeing this fun graffiti saying "the only magic I still believe in is love." Okay, I don't remember seeing it all, but drunk me was so struck by it that even she snapped a fuzzy picture of it. I go back to that picture, that trip, all the time. It was home. 

We can remember. 

I think Huntsville has always been the warmest. In the darkest months of my entire life I was given shelter from the bitter cold of loss and grief and rejection. Did I want the blankets? Nope, I walked around in shorts and sports bras, just to prove to myself how strong I was. Or maybe I just wanted to be numb. But I was given coffee and whiskey and honest to god conversation, all the best things to warm a broken soul. I was given an India-esque hospitality without a colonial right to it, a German nod to history without any backstory necessary and a familiarity that I haven't felt since the orange hula hoop mattered. I was given bars or the absence of them; the presence of others or the solitude of the backyard; the freedom to wander and the absolute luxury to be lost. I wouldn't hear it for months, and I wouldn't believe it for longer, but I was loved there. I was given the freedom, the chance and the choice to be me again. I wasted a lot of time being someone else.

We can unlearn. 

Follow your heart. Home is where the heart is. I guess that's why my house has always been the coldest. My heart hasn't been here in years. So many versions of my heart have shattered into pieces on the tile floor I remember Grandma being so excited about getting. This is where she died. I was here when Ro died. This is where someone I thought I loved tried to kill me. I am watching Sister die. She is going through her own renaissance, for sure, and I envy it because I don't think I have it in me again. Not here, anyway. I am dying again. I am dying here again. I don't know if the next place I end up will be hot or cold. Or if I will be receptive to any temperature at all. It's a choice, I guess. But I am scared. 

And when I get this way, I try to remember. I try to unlearn. Because we can learn. And I know the next place has you. And for longer than I know how to admit, you have always been home. I am trying to follow my heart but take my head with me. 

I can learn. 

Are you still coming? Am I still home? 

Dear Lover: You are the ONLY exception.

Now Listening: The Only Exception by Paramore*


When I was younger
I saw my daddy cry
And curse at the wind

I only saw him cry twice. But as I get older I see him curse at the wind more and more. You were with me at the hospital the last time I saw it; I returned the favor of sharing that intensely personal moment by snapping at you. I saw your face crumble and your body language shut down and shut me out in the waiting area of the emergency room where you'd sat with me for hours and I SWEAR I wanted at that moment to stop everything and fix it but I didn't know how to and I couldn't focus. So I just turned my attention to my wounded father and drowned myself in the paperwork he was too broken to handle. I know I apologized later as we drove down the not even close to lit Highway 92 and I know you forgave me, but I know that doesn't make it any better. 

He broke his own heart
And I watched
As he tried to reassemble it

Nothing kills me more than watching my own parents grow up. And older. I saw how grandchildren changed them and I will see that again on my moms' (not a grammar issue--I have two moms) side soon. (NEPHEW IS COMING.) But they (my three parents, total) are older, and I am older now too, and while I don't always agree with their sacrifices, I acknowledge that they made them with the best intentions in mind. It's like a fucked-up Rubik's cube where the algorithm always morphs into chaos. (I know, that math probably isn't right, but just bear with me.) I just want credit for the sacrifices I made too. I suffered too. I went without too. And in their own ways, my mom and dad have tried to make up for it. Because that's how time works, and just a few weeks ago my mother squeezed my hand in the theater as we watched the live-action Aladdin movie during the song I'm sure I sang incessantly as a 1st grader, but the Disney magic was gone. And my dad tried to get me a treat after the last doctor's appointment he went to when it was my turn to drive him back and forth. He tried. They tried. But I'm not seven anymore, and those Disney sing-alongs and Twix bars are just forgotten nostalgia for me, but probably muscle memory for them. And yeah, it was sad in both cases watching everyone's coping mechanisms and behavior patterns fall into the rushing river of time to be swept away and drowned forever, but this is how time works and it's weird to remind my parents of that sometimes. I don't really want yesterday back--just tell me now that yesterday mattered.

And my momma swore
That she would never let herself forget

But she did. She forgot a lot of things that I have to remember and I don't think it is fair. But it's not fair what happened to her, either. Empathy is hard. And hating your parents as a teenager is so easy because you understand the results of their choices, you live them, but you don't quite get why they made those choices. Why they were gone, or angry, or tired, or frustrated. And by the time I was a grown-up with my own kids, I was too tired and she was too busy being the grandma and we just let it go in favor of two perfect little boys having a united front to always fall back on. But what happens when those two beautiful innocent lynchpins of your adult relationship with your mom are gone, suddenly? Well, you revert, I guess. Here we are, both women, both hurting, both without the vocabulary to explain to each other why those hard choices had to be made. You just lie in the bed of consequences you made and dare the other to set it on fire. Because there's nothing left to lose. You get through it, but you don't really deal with it. You hold each other on Mother's Day on the floor of the dart room (it used to be your brother's room... time is a real bitch for the oldest AND youngest, I guess) while everyone else is in the kitchen. It's just one mother with her oldest daughter, and one mother without anything to show for it--not just twice for the two little boys who are gone but also for the little one who never was because, as I mentioned, life isn't fair. And sometimes it's not viable, either. Viable... sustainable... whatever... I guess it doesn't really matter for either of us now.

Sometimes there's nothing you can do, no matter what sacrifice you are willing to make.

For those of you who are not into subtlety, I had a miscarriage a few years ago, and I pretty much die a little bit more inside about it every day. Some days because I am mourning it and some days because I am grateful it happened before I could even get excited about anything. Before I could tell anyone. Before I could even believe it myself. Before Things Got Bad. Which is worse?  

Out of three kids, two are safe--the ones who were never mine. The one who could have been? Well, I guess I am the reason we can't have nice things. 

And that was the day that I promised
I'd never sing of love
If it does not exist, but darlin'

My favorite part of my last trip to see you was how you called me "darling" in front of your class and all the kids groaned like we were their parents kissing in front of the stove and dancing in the kitchen before dinner. I don't have a memory like that from my own childhood, and I don't know if you do either, but it seems like a cute Norman Rockwell thing to aspire to, right? 

My idea of love and what it looks like has changed so much in the last year. Not just with you but with everyone. I think the Greeks (or someone) had like eight words for different kinds of love. Like familial love, and the love of sour patch kids, and the way you love the feel of water dripping over your closed eyelids in the shower after a three-day bender trying to escape your problems. Or something like that. Anyway, I know it's always easy for me to say " I love you" and I know it's hard for you to hear (or hard to believe, or trust or something) but it's not a throwaway thing at the end of a phone call for me. I have always meant it every time, as much as I could at the time. As much as I knew how. I love freely and recklessly, and yeah, that's lead to me pouring time and energy into people who weren't worth it or didn't (or couldn't) stick around. But I mean it. I mean it every time. Give me some time and I promise I'll show you.  

You are, the only exception

I know I am not easy to love, or even like sometimes, or even deal with most of the time. I don't do it to be coy or cute or playful. I am legitimately trying. 

You are, the only exception

You're the only person who's seen all the deep dark scars I keep hidden. Do I wear face makeup? No--I don't know how to apply foundation and I think it's stupid anyway. But I've gone through great lengths to keep my emotional bruises hidden. Except for with you. 

You are, the only exception

I can cry about how I am in this weird state of growing up but also losing children but also gaining some more baby birds and also raising adults and also trying to find myself and you never. bat. an. eyelash. (You have beautiful eyelashes, by the way.) 

You are, the only exception

For the record, I don't even like this song. I didn't like it when it came out in 2009 and I definitely don't like it now because I've been listening to it on repeat for almost six hours while I try to eek these last meaningful words out of my tired, rusted fingers. 

You are the only exception

Maybe I know, somewhere
Deep in my soul
That love never lasts

Maybe it doesn't. I don't know--what the fuck do I know? But I like to think it does. I want to think that every person I ever loved, romantic or otherwise, has a little piece of me that they keep tucked away for rainy days. Like the stuffed animal we all took to college but kept hidden. But even that gets tattered, and if you left it in a box in your mother's garage for 12 years and then rediscovered it later when even the memories had faded, does it even matter anymore? But there are things that can outlast our fickle notions of love... things like trust and honesty and loyalty and compassion. Man... it's almost like I'm learning something...or something.

And we've got to find other ways
To make it alone
But keep a straight face

It's reeeeeeeeeallllly hard being away from you most of the time, but especially on nights like tonight. My poker face sucks, also. 

And I've always lived like this
Keeping a comfortable distance
And up until now
I had sworn to myself that I'm content
With loneliness

But it would be hard even if you were here with me in the room where The Walls Are Too Blue. I recognize that. You can't fix real estate Bob or how I'm sad about Roland or worried for Mark or anxious about a thousand things that aren't really the problem. But you'd try, I know that. You'd let me do that thing I like where I rest my forehead right into your collarbone and tangle my legs into yours until I can't feel the arm I'm lying on and I have to move but you know It's Not Over and you curl over with me so that we fall into new human peaks and valleys of knees and elbows as many times as it takes or as many episodes of West Wing as we are awake for until I fall into a fitful sleep and you have to ease me out of nightmares as the sun comes up. 

Because none of it was ever worth the risk

I'll have every nightmare twice over if it means waking up next to you. 

I'm in this weird place where I don't trust myself. I think I know what I'm doing, but I've made an awful lot of Fucked Up Choices lately. I used to be so "shoot now, ask questions later" but I see where that got me. I am trying to be more rational. More discerning with my attention. More judicious about how I dole out my time. More careful with who (whom!) I let in. 

But, you are, the only exception

I swear I sat by the trampoline and thought about it. I didn't know that it would be this hard. I didn't know I was so broken. I'm so sorry. 

You are, the only exception

I really appreciate how you don't like when I say "I'm broken." Because I'm not, I guess. Just wounded. I'll figure it out. We'll figure it out. We'll get it figured.

You are, the only exception

You told me once that you should be the exception. And it shook me. You know, "shook" as the youth would say. But you ARE. I PROMISE. And I know I do a shit job of SHOWING you most (all) of the time but you are. That's why (maybe) DEFINITELY why you get all of the ugly parts of me. "He just didn't understand your darkness," you said to me once. You didn't even know how much you meant it. I didn't know (at the time) how much it meant. But here it is. You wanted it all. Here you go. I know it sucks. I'll get better. I'll be better. I'll be me again. 

You are, the only exception

OKAY okay okayyyyyyyy being able to articulate it doesn't mean I can live it. Can you be patient with me a little longer while I work on me? Like you always have been? Like since a decade ago when I was scared? 

I've got a tight grip on reality
But I can't let go of what's in front of me here

Reality SUCKS. (Hey, remember that time you made me watch Reality Bites because I'm so pop-culture illiterate? I do..) The last five years of my life WERE NEVER WORTH THE RISK (SEE ABOVE) and I know yours weren't either. It HURTS. People SUCK. Bitches be TRIPPIN'.

BUT WE HAVE SUCH A BADASS THING! Let's not waste it because I'm broken. I mean...

I'm so glad we were both still risk-takers when we re-met. One more chancers. One last time. 

I know you're leaving in the morning when you wake up
Leave me with some kind of proof it's not a dream

Nightmares are my least favorite thing about The Thing that I am going through. I HATE that my favorite part of waking up next to you is often ruined by the hazy remnants of a door slamming, or incessant teasing, or something as innocent as a child's first day of school or as damaging as the feeling of a pinewood dresser digging into your shoulder as you're thrown against it. 

I know the logistics of Us are hard and I'm trying to cope with the coming and going as best as I can. I know I suck at it. I know it's harder at my house. I know I try to inject life into this place via family dinners and Instant Pot Days and Hey Let's Watch a Random Netflix Documentary Nights with friends but when all those people leave it's just me and THIS FUCKING HOUSE and I know you pay for that when you answer my early morning phone calls. And I am sorry for it. And I am sad about it. Death and decay are etched into every square inch of the drywall around here, and it's hard not to give in to that atrophy and entropy sometimes. I can tell you; don't ask me to show you.     

You are, the only exception

I would show you. I already have. I'm sorry those dents in the wall and on the counters are so attached to my skin.   

You are, the only exception

I'm sorry for that time I was embarrassed and you expertly led me to the pool without question. We can talk about it if you want. I can talk about it. Even here. BECAUSE FUCK THESE PEOPLE. And also, more importantly, you make me feel fearless and I know that my awkward feelings about writing pale in comparison to the people who don't have a voice. I can help people. I have before. Just IMAGINE what I can do with you by my side. LOOK AT WHAT I'VE ALREADY DONE. Oh, babe, you have no idea. I called crying about the miscarriage section alone TWICE because...

You are, the only exception 

I literally just answered a work email that I had no business answering at 3 AM not due to lack of knowledge but because I AM MID EXISTENTIAL CRISIS AND CAN'T THEY JUST FIGURE IT OUT??

You are, the only exception

I'm sure they could figure it out, but goddamit I love being involved and it's MY lab I have to at least keep up with the smart people, right? Thank you so much for rearranging your house every time I come over so that I have a yoga studio and an office and A Crying Room. You are pretty fucking spectacular. Do you know that?

You are, the only exception

Of course you know. You've been the solid rock behind all of my work endeavors from November til now. Every demo, every secret meeting, every international flight, every case of food poisoning and homesickness. Every window ledge, every Call of the Void, the understanding behind every perfected selfie, the umbrella over my head on 7th in Ybor. 

You are, the only exception

Jesus CHRIST I hate this song. 

You are, the only exception

You told me once I was a great verbal breakdancer as a writer and sometimes I wonder if that's still true. If now that you see how much it takes out of me and how I "verbal process" in person if you still admire the end result so much. Do you see now? Did you see before? Do you still love me? To be honest, this isn't my best work. But it might be my most honest. 

You are, the only exception

You really are the only exception. I've had people lie cheat and steal their way in. And I've let people waltz on in with no invitation to speak of, if we're being realsies here. I am tired. I am broken. I am busy. I am depressed. I am anxious. I am in the process of unlearning things Someone Awful taught me. I am mourning. I am so young. I am too old for this. I should know better. I should have known better. I am getting stronger every day. I am strong. I am a good big sister. I am pretty. I am smart. I am hilarious. I am good at my job. I am a fantastic hostess. I am a thoughtful gift giver. I was worthy of the Chromcast you gave me and set up for me, and those flowers, and the USF necklaces that hang in my office, and the time you spent driving me to Houston and San Antonio and Old Town Spring and wherever else, and I am worthy of the space in your closet where my favorite Converse live and the dresser drawers where my clothes are AND I SWEAR IF YOU TOOK THAT BOBBY PIN OUT OF YOUR CAR I WILL END YOU BECAUSE THEN HOW WILL THOSE OTHER HOOKERS KNOW THAT YOU ARE SPOKEN FOR and I am also very confident that I deserve a space in your heart. 

And I'm on my way to believing
Oh, and I'm on my way to believing

*I really hate this song.