clutter

let her go

"Never let me go," she told you once under the never sky. Now you look back and think, I won't, love, but it's too late for that now, isn't it?

You look up at the bottom of the clouds and remember the time you and her were cloud gazing. She looked up at the sky, pointing at a big cloud with a smile on her face and said, "It's a whale!"

You remember making her laugh by speaking whale like Dory from Finding Nemo and you remember the way she rolled over, onto her stomach, to look you in the eyes with her stormy grey irises and the way she bit her bottom lip. You remember the way you sat up on your elbows to kiss her for the first time; tender and slow; slow and tender.

"By the way," you remember you said, "it was more like a shark."

She smiled, suppressed a silly laugh. You watched her smile fade to something curious, something serious, something sweet. And you asked her, "Whale you love me forever?"

"Dolphinately, darling."

You try to make a dream and make it last, but dreams are hard to come by and you lost the only thing you had going for you, didn't you? Maybe one day you'll understand why everything you touch surely dies.

You see her honey blond hair when you close your eyes. She smiles wide at something you said in your mind. You reach out to touch her, but all you touch is air and air is nothing, nothing, compared to her and you open your eyes to see the ceiling and that damn ceiling fan that has a way of making your head spin round and round with memories of her.

You're alone again, by yourself again, without her again.

You think back to one night in her room and the way she told you about the glow-in-the-dark-stars on her ceiling and why she collected them.

"I want to look up at the stars every night, because one day I'll be up there with them."

"Will you take me with you?"

You remember the way she shook her head; slow and sad. "No."

"Then will you watch over me?"

"Dolphinately."

Something tugs at your insides and you know you miss her. You loved her too much, trusted her too much, to show her how you felt so you ran away and never looked back. Youlethergoyoulethergoyo-

Oh, God, why did you let her go?

-Alethiometer