cigarette smoke.

dried liquor

you're afraid of lightning.

you think you might've died once, but you can never seem to remember how.

it's odd, you wonder what the dreams are telling you. you wonder if, when you wake up shrieking for hope, it means anything. you wonder a lot. it dries your bones and leaves your vodka bottles empty, stuffs your mind so full of blank that it hurts. you want it to leave you for dead―

just a little bit. maybe. the night whispers like it owed you something for the noise it tightens around the stars, like you owe it, for being mortal. for bieng human.

if you're human at all, that is.

(you don't know what died, the last time you hid in a body, burrowed past the little sticky consciousness there, you dream of fire and smoke and golden moons crying radiator green.)

you dry your eyes and throw out the empty bottle. if you didn't die, you will not mourn, the dead do not know, if you don't.

you can't bear it anymore, the swallowing terror of the lichtenberg figure on your back.

(DO YOU REGRET IT? ALL THOSE THINGS YOU NEVER BECAME? says your reflection.)

(DO YOU REGRET WHAT YOU ARE, CHILD? you say back.)

.
.
.

[you fall into the water, and you drown, when you wake up next time, your doctor is concerned with your near delusions with water.

you never drowned, they all say.

after all, you're right here.]