We Are

Broken Thing

I scream her name in the rain. The heavy drops hit my face drowning the sound away in their thunder as they shatter me. I scream again and again until her name loses its meaning, until it's just a sound that I keep whispering, for far longer than my voice bears.

I return home frozen to the bone, drenched in cold sweat, rainwater and tears. Luckily for me, no one can tell one from another, to them I just look like another loser who got stuck out in the rain, hoarse from the cold he's developing and not from having screamed for hours. They look at me with concern and slight confusion but I cannot look back at them. I can't see any of their faces, because every last line reminds me of her.

Stumbling towards my bed I wonder why I let them stay here. Falling atop of the duvet, still soaking wet, I realize that it's because I owe her that much. Or maybe because without them, I wouldn't be alive.

They can't do much in their house, now that all the furniture is gone, except sleeping, and even that they prefer doing on my couch and a mattress in front of it. I can't do much without them either. If it wasn't for them I would probably had given up long ago. But then again, if it wasn't for them, maybe she wouldn't have left. No, I tell myself, none of this is their fault.

I don't usually mind them being here anyway. For the last month, it's often been nice to see familiar faces, to hear someone call me Tom, like she used to.

But some nights it's unbearable.

I still haven't figured out what's causing these nights to be so special. Some nights I'm fine, I even find myself laughing, as we sit around my tiny table, trying to find room for five hungry mouths. But some nights I run out of my own home, as if escaping a prison. I've tried telling myself that it's because I miss her, or because I feel betrayed because she left me. I've tried to convince myself that she broke me, but deep down inside I know that it isn't true. I have been broken for years. Her leaving has just become an excuse to let it show.

I despise myself for that, for being this weak, for screaming her name in the rain. I hate how pathetic I've become, how fragile and vulnerable. I hate the way my ears automatically pick up every sound outside my door, hoping against all odds that it's her steps that echo on the stairs.

Stupid. She never made a sound. I never heard her walk up those stairs. She always moved with the swift grace of a dancer, but with none of a dancer's calm. Her steps weren't light due to years with music, no, the only steps she knew were those of escape. Her eyes always darted, as if scanning the room for threats. Her steps didn't leave a sound because she was afraid to leave even such a small trace on this world as the echo of her steps in my stairwell.

Someone helps me up from my bed. Someone forces me to shower and changes my wet sheets. Someone tucks me into a dry bed and I can't remember who's warm hands soothe the pain away with pills I don't remember getting. Later, I assume it was Mickey, even though he never mentions it to me. I fall into darkness stumbling over thoughts but never grasping any single one. I lose myself and when I wake up it's morning.

And she's still gone. And I'm still left. And it's still Autumn. And I'm still broken. 

Thanks for reading // Alex