dreamland

six

A lot of time has passed, so many minutes and hours and days and weeks.
I will say that the pain has diminished to a soft soft spot of blue where my heart rests. But I still am taken away to a time where you and I were together.

My mind; finds yet another piece, buried inside and pulls it out, a memory with the focus on your face. I always feel as if I am asleep where I recall yet another memory with your face and hands in it. They don't feel real at all. Because my mind still cannot wrap around the idea that it is the same person.

The one that lied so many times to my face is the one that kissed me and looked at me as if I were the only one that existed. How can it be? I was never the only one that existed to you.

It's what kept me up. I would rise from my bed and look out, wondering and wondering where you were. But then being so grateful that I didn't have to see you and that I didn't know. It was better off this way anyway.

I couldn't even look her in the eye when I saw her at the grocery store. She was holding a bag of limes and a black carton of low fat ice cream.
I was with my mom as she looked through the cereal and oatmeal boxes when I caught sight of her black hair. I think she saw me first because when I turned, her eyes were already looking my way, even as a little girl pulled at her arm and said her name. I turned away even though I knew she wanted to talk to me, her eyes were saying what her mouth couldn't. But just like her mouth couldn't say my name, I couldn't even begin to talk to her either.

Last I had heard, through your best friend, you had vanished after those four times you came to find me.

The first time was when I was already asleep, among cotton candy skies and rose petals. I was dreaming of finally something nice, something that didn't fill me with even more blue and red.

You claimed while in your drunken state, that you had been there for already thirty minutes before I awoke.
I didn't believe you with my arms wrapped around my bare shoulders and the fireflies moving around us. I shouldn't have come down, I knew this too well.

My friend had slept over but like me, she was a very heavy sleeper. If she would have awoken, she would have told me not to come down and even pulled me back.

But she didn't hear your voice as you called out my name and dialed my number nine times. Just like she didn't feel or hear me push the covers over her head as I got out the bed to see your face below my window. If she had, then I think we would have both lied in my bed, staring at the ceiling and listening to the sound of your voice. It would have gone on and on until finally your best friend came to pick you up and we fell back asleep.

Your words were just slightly slurred as you ran your tongue over your lips and I stood there my face stoic. I felt like the outside climate: it wasn't cold, I wasn't sad, it wasn't hot, I wasn't angry. But still, my heart thumped fast like it had the night I first kissed you.

You said that you loved me and only me and I didn't believe it for a second. Not when I began to see red again, the red of her lips, the red of her nails that day I saw her at the grocery store as she gripped her sister's hand. You kept taking step after step closer to me and I would just double my steps back. I didn't want to be near you; you smelled of booze and fresh air and cinnamon. A smell I really liked because it was your scent after all.

But on that night, all I wanted was for it to cease.

You kept saying you loved me and that you needed me, you only needed me, you said. I don't think I was even listening, only hearing the sound of your voice as my eyes flickered around all your features. Every once in awhile, a firefly would fly over your head or near your shoulder and light up a tiny piece of you. I stopped at your eyes when I realized you had stopped speaking. You were high too. Your eyes were constricted and unfocused and you kept passing your tongue over your lips.

You said my name and I hated that I actually chose to listen when you said it. You hiccuped and told me, you'd been so stupid to believe you were actually in love with her. You dropped your voice and told me that you hadn't planned on meeting me, you were already with her. I started to comprehend. I really started to listen and the more I did, the more the pieces of what we had, fell into place.

She had been first, she had done what I had done with you before I did.

You reached for my wrist and I calmly took three steps back. You begged me to please, please, understand that you hadn't wanted to hurt me. I spoke for the first time that night, I asked you then why didn't you just tell me you were already with her.

All your smooth words and charismatic smirks couldn't help you now.

You didn't have an answer for me just like I knew you wouldn't.
You ran both hands through your hair and said I don't know, fuck, I don't know.

I smiled without an ounce of humor and said, yeah, I knew you wouldn't know.
I turned and went inside where I finally cried and even hiccuped in between sobs.