cake and cosmic apotheosis | lgbtq+

consternation.

She was here three days ago. 

Her small frame last imprinted itself on my sheets three days ago. The wonderous cacophony of her clumsiness ceased to play three days ago. Her fragrance—the smell of hopeful despair—escaped me three days ago. The taste of her soft lips, the pitter patter of her small feet on the kitchen floor, the little strands of hair she used to leave behind her like breadcrumbs—all gone.

Astrid was here three days ago.

I've cried since she's been gone. I've bawled like a miserable child, both hoping and dreading that she'd return only to find me a soggy pile of melancholy on my closet floor. She used to cup my face whenever she found me sitting in my closet, the only place I felt I could cry in peace, and she'd kiss my tears away and murmur sweet nothings across my face until I knew everything would be okay. Nothing could go wrong as long as Astrid was with me.

I remember the very first time Astrid discovered me in my closet. Everything was so new then. She kept fading for hours on end, and I was a mess. I sobbed every time she returned. I sobbed every time she went away. After a while, it simply became too much for me to bear. I felt too much too intensely, and my heart needed a break from being broken. But Astrid found me before I could muster the strength to turn the key in the door, to lock her away for at least a few minutes.

"Casey." She was on her knees before I knew it. "Oh god, Casey."

I'd simply shaken my head and attempted to reach for the doorknob. "I can't. I can't right now."

Astrid placed her lips on my forehead, wrapping her thin arms around me. "I'm here."

No, you're not, I wanted to spit.

"Don't worry. I'm here—"

"For how long?" I started her down with my bloodshot eyes. "How long are you going to be here for? A minute? And then you'll leave for hours? Days? Years?"

"I'm not going to leave you," she crooned. I let her rock us back and forth, let her sneak the key to the closet door from my hand. My eyes stung with hot tears, but I refused to let anymore fall. "I promise."

"You can't make promises."  Then, shakily, I added, "You don't exist."

That was the first time we'd ever talked about it. The first time I'd ever brought her existence up.

I could tell Astrid was surprised, but she remained the epitome of benign comfort. After a long moment, she kissed my forehead again, tugging her fingers through my hair. "Only half of the time," she whispered.

Only half of the time.

It made me laugh at the time, purely because I hadn't known what she meant. I hadn't understood that the same helpless abandonment I'd needed to lock myself in my closet to deal with would sink its fingers our future together. I didn't understand how those five words could ever become the source of my anxiety—my constant consternation. But everything is so old now, and I'm a lot wiser. Astrid's been gone for three days now.

I've been alone for three days now.