Flinch

You don’t like being the underdog. You don’t like other people cracking the whip on you. You are your own boss. But this thing—you can’t even say it, because it makes you sick and it makes you vulnerable and powerless—this love, this emotion that you feel for this person snoozing next to you, it reminds you of sunshine, red balloons, Hallmark greeting cards for Valentine’s Day, Hall and Oates love songs and all that sappy crap and at the same time it makes you sad. This is the thing about loving someone so much they practically have you wrapped around their finger.
Your love for her is so much it makes you want to tear your hair out and die a million times.
You’re going insane, that’s for sure.

DYSFUNCTIONAL

That is the word that best describe your relationship.

DISMAL

Another word to describe it.

Dysfunctional yet neither wants to move out of your lair. Neither makes a move to call the ‘relationship therapist’ and book an appointment. Relationship therapist, what a silly term anyway, you thought. Like ‘hair technician’. Or ‘foot doctor’.

“They’re called podiatrists, Cole.’’ She said. It was late—around 3 AM maybe—and you were both hopped up on ice cream and coffee and there’s a humdrum documentary about shoes and dead toenails in that one channel nobody seems to watch. She knows a lot of things.

“Damn son, you know some serious shit.” And with that you received a heartfelt laugh.

Neither wants to let go of each other. You know each other too well that it’s too dangerous to pull the plug that has been keeping all the secrets tacked inside your heads from spilling.

She knows about that one time you huffed spray paint to get high when you were nine.

She knows about that one time you slept with one of your teachers when you were a senior in high school. You told everyone you lost your virginity to a pretentious senior when it was really your English teacher who you fornicated with.

She knows all your good parts. Where to tickle you. Where to kiss you. What to do to make you writhe in pleasure, sending you into that state where you numerously call out the name of gods you sure don’t even believe in.

She knows about that time you almost sell your body for sex.

You know about her shoplifting history.

That time she spat on her boss’s coffee.

About Uncle Ben lifting her skirt in the attic.

She knows about your mental condition and boy, she does love seeing you losing it.

She knows where and when to press and inflict the utmost damage on you. She knows how to lay her hands on your obscured fears. She loves seeing you throwing things against the wall. And whenever that happens, she would look at you, those pretty eyes of hers challenging you to hurl objects within your reach. She loves wrecking you, as much as you secretly love mentioning Uncle Ben’s misdeed on her young and delicate body. It’s evil, you know that, and it makes you feel terrible afterwards but this horrible itch under your skins, you can’t resist scratching it. You both wanted to see your limits, how hard you can push.

***

Monday morning. After taking a bath, you go to the bookshelf and look for books to re-read. It is noontime and you don’t have chores to do anymore, you just want to lie on the floor and get lost in whatever fictional world you’re going to venture in again this time. As you look further, you notice the space between Palahniuk’s Fight Club and Kerouac’s On the Road. Your beat up copy of Murakami’s Sputnik Sweetheart, one of your all-time favourite novels, was supposed to be wedged between Tyler Durden, The Narrator, Sal Paradise and Dean Moriarty. That spot belongs to Sumire, K and Miu. But like Dodos and dinosaurs, the book is gone. You reach out for your cell phone and dial her number. She picks up after the 4th ring.