| highest rank: #214 in short story |
piece by piece, leaf by leaf, and as each season passes me by, I will follow her into tomorrow
cover by the wonderful @eunxia-
The snow around our home near Canada trapped us in a snow globe of bitter cold and bitter people for months.
Sicily kept having nightmares about the accident.
She kept overthinking our relationship.
She stopped eating.
She started crying more.
She was shattering in slow motion; a piece of her would crumble into finite dust at a single misstep or worried glance.
At some point, I gave up.
Now, I look at the house, covered in snow and feel nothing.
Sicily wants me to go.
She says she needs to figure herself out.
She says this after I find her in a bank of snow, wrapped only in her milky hair.
Waking up to the screams of the person I love is the color of rope against flesh.
The bruise starts small, as the rope coils tighter and tighter, seductively forcing the breathe from my lungs.
As I kick at the air, struggling to see, my vision blurs with tears and the dark kisses of death.
It's a kaleidoscope of broken things stuffed into my eyes: two tortured souls, a broken boy, and a shattered girl with ivory hair.
The light reflects on the sparkle of tears on freckled skin and the thrum of screams forms the lullaby of my nightmares.
Waking up to a broken song bird, helplessly beating her wings in the confines of her mind causes my chest to heave.
Sicily writhes next to me, nearly every night.
I can't tell if I'm sick or if I'm already dead.
I can't do anything to stop Sicily from falling apart.
I can't do anything because I'm useless.
She knows it too.
As I leave the broken home that could have been something, I feel relieved and melancholy.
I'll always love Sicily.
I understand loving someone is different from the passion people can share.
Sicily and I used to be a forest fire.
That's passion though, not love.
I love Sicily enough to live everyday without her, knowing she'll breathe more freely without me as a cage, keeping her chained away in the confines of my adoration and longing for our past.
I love Sicily enough to give her food, even as she says she's full, with her ribs carving tattoos of bones against her moon-kissed skin.
I love Sicily enough to hide the black, velvet box with a satin cushion and an intricate ring in its center.
I love Sicily enough to walk down the snowy path as the midnight air bites my nose, ignoring a broken girl's sobs as she thrashes in the bed made for two.
I love Sicily enough to let every memory of her disappear like melting snow.
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