OUT OF (TOUCH) ... eddie munson

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LUCILLE HAD COME TO WITH MAX BY HER SIDE.

there was still that inner distortion; that funny feeling that implied a bleak detachment from herself. she felt like she was not herself for a moment. she did not know where she was after what felt like a year of blackness. she was an unknowing child, fearful and lost and subconsciously crawling back to herself.

"lucille?"

her head jerked, and she gasped at the reappearance of time and surroundings. she looked at the girl to her right– hair like a wildfire. her eyes were pale and ice-chipped. behind the blueness of her eyes, she was limpid. readable. lucille took a moment to render who she was. she knew that the girl was a bride of solitude before she could understand who max mayfield was. she breathed a shallow breath at the sweet arrival of recognition.

"max?"

the ember-haired girl, max, would nod. her brows would remain furrowed, concerned. there was a look on her which lucille could not grasp during the moments it took for her to come back. but her finger grazed the metallic ridges on the surface of the bleacher between them. and then she recognized it, however unfamiliar– remorse weighed heavy on the mayfield girl's eyes as she stared at the lonesome creature before her.

the air had not quite reached the bottom of lucille lichen's lungs. there was a drag of the breeze as she took a much deeper breath, eyes lidding as she and max stayed looking at each other. max breathed with her.

"are you okay?"

lucille's lower lip had somewhat tucked underneath the upper one, and she looked down in the direction of the rained-on field silt. there was a tan murkiness pooling along the rhythm of the field's surface. it had rained, still. she glanced up at the sky, "yeah..." and looked back to her young friend, "yeah, i'm okay."

"are you sure?"

the cadence of her voice meant she didn't believe lucille; she knew that much. "i'm sorry," she finally said. "i understand, i've... i've been asking too much of you, and spending too much time worrying about you and trying to fix myself in fixing you. i know you aren't broken, and i didn't mean to treat you like a shattered doll– i don't mean to co– to coddle you or– or... look at you different, i'm not a he–"

"would you shut up?"

lucille's jaw went slack, and she gaped at the girl, blinking uncertainty watched by max, who faced her with parallel juxtaposition. max looked disgusted, almost. lucille was how she typically was– a spaniel, eager to please and to satiate. she tried to speak, her lips puckering and twisting and unwinding. "wh... wh-wha-w... w-what?"

"you're doing it again," max stated, a small nod. she looked between each eyeball of lucille's. "i fucked up. i'm fucking up. this is my fault, this is on me." she almost spat, and lucille saw the girl gather all the air she could into her lungs, a feeble pause. "... i hurt you. don't you remember? you should be angry with me, you should hate me.

"i keep pushing you away and forgetting we're together on, like, this... this cliff." she licked her lips, looking up. "you keep coming back to me, and i keep throwing you out like a stray cat." she tried to get it through to the girl; to speak clearly and articulate and use proper inflections. to force eye contact onto the girl.

"you're amazing, and you pull me– you don't push me. you pull, and you let me take the tiniest of baby steps. you don't push and throw me in the deep end. you give me your arm, and you offer support, always, like some sort of stupid tugboat, and i can wade in the shallow for a second, but i always leave you there, and you always stay in that damn water and offer support when i'm ready to give it another go, and i was so cruel–" max had cut herself off so she could breathe. she had begun to blubber, "i am the one who's supposed to be sorry, not you! so please, please please, shut up and let me be the bad g–"