reprising the bitch

	Lily Allen   Littlest Things   Alright, Still

It would be nice if lovers were like movies. I’d have lovers in boxes, on bookshelves, a messy pile by the bed. There are some movies that you see only once, others you play over and over again without tiring. I could rank my lovers and keep the good ones close to the television.

I run my hands through a particular pile. There’s a movie I need to play, a scene I desperately need to see. It was a moment when I felt happy, when I thought love was the strongest thing in the world. I turn the television on, pop the disc in and allow the images to fill my mind.

It’s been years since I saw it but this movie still feels very fresh. I wonder how long my mind can preserve these thoughts. They say moments like this never cease to exist. They’re just there, suspended in time for all eternity. Why then do I feel like I’m seeing a picture slowly overexposing? It’ll be all white soon. I need to recapture it with my mind’s eye.

Will I always remember the darkness of his eyes, the firmness of his grip or the smell of the street as it rained?

We were walking home, one of many walks we took around that time. It was past midnight and though darkness lurked in every corner, I felt safe with your arm around me. I don’t really remember where we came from or what we were doing. All I know is right there, right at the intersection, I realized we were at the point of no return. We had somehow jumped off a cliff together and made it out alive. You were already a part of me, a part that would hurt if ripped out.

“So this is me,” I said, my standard goodbye. My umbrella made little splashes as water dripped into a small puddle by my feet.

“Thank you for tonight,” he said, the street lights reflecting on his dark brown eyes. If I ever drowned in those dark pools, it would be the sweetest way to die.

And then he kissed me. Under the moonlight, under the guidance of the nighttime sky, he wrapped his arms around me as our lips touched. I felt lightheaded. In the middle of it all, I felt him push a small piece of paper into my hand.

“What’s this?” I asked.

“It’s nothing,” he answered. “It’s just a note. Read it when you get inside.”

As I watched him walk away, his shoes making splashes on the water, my knees felt a little weak. Here was a man madly in love with me. I didn’t know what I did to deserve him but he calls my heart his home. When I was younger, I often wondered if I had let my chance to fall in love pass me by. But then all I needed to do was see him smiling at me and my heart would fill with hope. His smile expressed a silent wish. Maybe tomorrow won’t be so bad.

It was just a moment, a split second in the quilt of history, but it was our moment. I closed my apartment door, a huge smile on my face as my body sank to the floor. I touched my lips, the same ones he just kissed as my other hand struggled in my jean pocket for the note he gave me.

“This love, ever ours,” it said. How silly of me to believe.

Is it wrong to hold on to him like this? It’s just one of those days, one of those feelings I don’t indulge all the time. The end credits of our movie starts rolling, a song playing softly in the background. Would you take it against me if I asked you to dance? I close my eyes and imagine him in front of me. I wrap my arms around him, a feeble embrace as my hands fall limply on where I remember his neck to be. Our bodies move to the soft beat. If I tried hard enough, I swear I could even smell him. I inhale sharply, let his scent fill my very being. Outside, the clouds start to darken. Something tells me it’s going to rain soon.

Original Posts: Moment, Dati...

infidelity

	Amy Winehouse   I Heard Love Is Blind   Frank

How do I say this without hurting you? I cheated on you last night with the ghost of lovers past. I was looking through some old letters and I started recreating these scenes in my mind. Letters, pictures, movie tickets and condom wrappers- I was hoarding memories, certain that love is always too fleeting to remember, too moody to contain.

I laid out all the letters on my bedroom floor and for a while, I was just sitting there, wondering where their writers were. Do they still think of me? I closed my eyes and touched myself. I tried to remember how each kiss felt, how each moan sounded. Do my lovers touch themselves when they remember me?

He came out of nowhere. When I opened my eyes, he was in front of me, inviting me, seducing me. He took my hand and led me to the bed. He whispered words in my ear, words I often wish you could say. I believed him for once upon a time, those words were true. He was true and so I let him do what he wanted.

He touched me in all the familiar places. His mouth traveled from my lips to my ears, my neck and the small of my back. He hit me like he used to when I was younger. The shear weight of his arm sent me flying. More, I begged him and he hit me again. Each strike set my skin on fire. Each bruise felt like I was coming closer to my true home.

I entered him with force and abandon. It felt just like it used to. As I pushed myself in and out, I realized the rhythm was familiar. It was a song my heart once sang to. I still knew all the words.

He was getting closer and closer to climaxing. I could tell in the way his legs were tensing up. I tried to focus on coming, too but I couldn’t. I started losing interest. I started realizing my mistakes. His face to the heavens, he couldn’t tell that I was no longer into it. I started getting soft. My heart and my body were too in sync to continue.

And then a curious thing happened. I thought of you. I thought of what we have. I thought of all the things I wanted to do to you and I got hard again. I thought of the life we could have together if we only got over our fears. I thought about your face, the lines pulsating each time I thrust into the ghost’s being. I imagined your face on his, recreating your eyes, your nose and your lips from shear memory.

I thought of you and I came. I exploded inside the ghost; my seed flying into the air, sullying the letters and pictures on the floor. I picked them up and tossed them into the trash. It was high time I threw them out anyway. Though they kept me warm through the many cold nights before I called your heart my home, the second hand ticking on the clock tells me there’s no use holding on to them anymore. I’m letting them go, love. I’m sorry it took this long. I’m letting them go to let you in.

Till next time, said the ghost as he put on his shirt.

There won’t be a next time, I promised.

There will always be a next time, he said, a smile on his face as he disappeared into the darkness.

Photo Credit: embrace

chances

	Platinum Weird   Taking Chances   Platinum Weird (Unreleased)

On nights like this when my mind won’t lend itself to sleep, I find myself thinking of you. There are many things to be said. Sometimes, the burden of the silent elephants in the room becomes too heavy to hold and I feel like if I don’t write it all down, I’ll somehow explode. And so I try, even though each word feels like a betrayal, each attempt fails at capturing what I see when I see you.

I escape into my imagination. We are at a park bench with a view of the city. It’s a view borrowed from a movie. There is a distance between us, perhaps because we are afraid to touch. We talk about menial things like the weather or how the birds fly from one side of the sky to the other. We talk about books and music. We talk about religion, politics and all other topics until there is only one thing left to talk about- us.

“I know you’re afraid,” I begin, constantly on eggshells. “It doesn’t really help that I’m scared shitless too. I just think that if we don’t give this a shot, we would be wasting everything.”

You are silent. I look at your spot on the bench and notice that you have your eyes closed. Even in slumber, you are so beautiful. I have never seen someone so at peace, so stunning it hurts, in my entire life. Gravity takes over and your head falls gently on my shoulder. I hold my breath so that my inhales and exhales won’t wake you up. I move only when necessary so that I would not shake you. Slowly, I feel your hand search for mine. For the first time, we touch. My fingers wrapped around yours, something tells me that if I don’t hold on to something, I might float away.

And if I had to spend the rest of my life holding my breath, our hands in embrace like two lovers lost in time, I wouldn’t really mind. I would never, ever mind.

Photo Credit: iamnotastalker

beachbuoy

If years were hours then today would be the start of a new day. This year, I am celebrating away from the lullaby of buses opening and closing. There are many things to be grateful for and I can only hope to be just as blessed in the years ahead.

Photo Credit: winding bay

	The Beatles Birthday The White Album

quiet

To the one who called me Gori. Because this doesn’t hurt anymore.

When we were younger and much more in love, we'd often lose ourselves in pointless conversations. I love you, I’d whisper in your ear. I love you more, you’d say. No, I love you more, I’d say, stressing every word. We’d do this again and again, neither of us predicting that who loves who more was not the right question to ask. It’s who’s letting go first?

This isn’t the hardest decision to make. If anything, I think I’m doing both of us a favor. There is a strange need to leave this place as it was when I first got here. I close my eyes and in my mind’s eye, I picture the apartment from three years ago. There is furniture to be moved, walls to be painted and curtains to be changed. The sofa would prove to be challenging. I remember our combined strengths couldn’t life the damn thing. I shook off this thought. That sofa is moving if it kills me, I said to you even though you weren’t around. Everything has to be exactly the way it was. It should be like I was never here at all.

---

We were artists convinced that our little paintings could somehow change the world. I wanted to do nothing but paint your face, the crook of your elbow, the small of your back, the stray strands of hair that peaked from your boxer shorts. We bought tons and tons of canvasses, locked ourselves in separate worlds so we could be in our respective elements. We shared an immense desire to capture our love in watercolor (yours) and oil-based paint (mine). I chose the kitchen so I could be close to the fridge. You, the den so you could be close to the books.

The easel couldn’t hold you, or at least how I thought of you. It was too small, too frail to capture the strength in your eyes or the calm in your voice. One by one, I took the spices off the cupboard. I unhinged the racks and the hooks that held the pans until I had a free wall to myself. For days, I ate nothing but dumplings, pausing only to shit, smoke or both. In about a week, I had your face on the biggest wall of the house. I remember thinking I had never been as happy, so filled to the brim with contentment.

You often locked yourself in the den. You didn’t want me to see what you came up with. My mind was brewing with anticipation. But then hours turned into days, days into weeks and I saw nothing. One day, I realized the ochre I used to color your cheeks had turned a dirty shade of brown. My mural was fading and I still hadn’t seen a single painting of yours.

While you were sleeping, I crept up the narrow hallway to the den. I had to see it. I had to meet the child you birthed and reared in that room for several months. The lock resisted at first but with a little more effort, it finally gave way. It was pitch dark. Outside, the moon shone like a lover’s secret wish. I groped in the darkness for the switch. Nothing could have prepared me for that moment. I had to look away from the easel that stood lonely in the center of the room. It was empty. All your canvasses were empty. Your brushes sat dusty on top of a pile of books.

In the middle of the canvas, in clumsy red paint, I wrote you my first and only letter. They say expectations are premeditated resentments. I’m sorry I resented too much.

---

The sofa would prove to be challenging. On the radio, a woman sings me a song. It’ll be just as quiet when I leave as it was when I first got here, she promised. I push the gargantuan set, leaving large, ugly scratches on the wooden floor.

Photo Credit: the empty canvas

	Rachael Yamagata Quiet Happenstance