r e m e m b e r i n g;; ;;f o r g e t t i n g

f a i r y l i g h t s

he loved the fairy lights hanging from his curtain pole. he'd leave them turned on far into the night until 11-o'clocks and 12-o'clocks were carried along with their beams. sometimes he'd awake from his alarm and the lights would still be on. he forgot to turn them off. or maybe it's that he remembered to keep them on.
he painted lightbulbs onto the walls next to his desk when he was 12. then he taped fairy lights onto the painted bulbs. underneath he wrote odd words he found over years with a black marker. it was mainly just single words or short phrases. he'd piece them together eventually, but today wasn't the day.
he went to ikea once, and there were fairy lights. he could have stayed there for hours staring at them. cinnamon and caramel fell from the ceiling.
it was oh so beautiful, but so sticky.
he was stuck.
and the lights were stuck in his eyes.