Letters to My Former Best Friends

T - 1999 - 2010
Our whimsical childhood filled with creatures of incredible imagination ended with you.  I could go on forever in that world with adjacent minds and singed hearts, but it ended with you.  Our fantasy quickly faded and morphed into a harsh reality when you gave a quick hug accompanied by the absence of eye contact.  We were no longer damsels, and suddenly you seemed like the indifferent, much too cool, step-sister.  Even though you are 1 year and 7 months younger than me.  Even though you used to be on my side.
We were destined to be hand in hand for a long while, but you cut off all contact when you moved away.  Except, you still see C and I'm just sitting here holding on to nostalgia. And I will never forgive you for that. I'm starting to think you were on her side all along. (Was it because you were both in AM and I was in PM?)

C - 1995 - 2010
I think you're just too cool for me now.  Or it could be that I horribly and tremendously broke your heart.

J - 2001 - 2005
And you're too good for me.  But, this whole best friend thing was never mutual anyway.  We may have bonded extremely well over fowl and stallions, but not over what truly mattered.  Because I could never be there for you like she could.  You know, your (to this very day) best friend.  And I think she knows a lot more about you than I do because you didn't teach me, but I didn't teach you either.

S - 2009 - 2010
We were such a good pair.  You always endeavored to make me happy and I wasn't such bad company, right?  Although, I don't know if you were really utilizing your entire potential when following through with your so called plan.  I'm starting to wonder if you got close to me with a strategy alternate to your plan. Because I did terrible things under your reign and some people still have not found it in their hearts to forgive me.

J - ? - ?
I hardly remember my time with you except the time you spent kissing my cousin.

H - Summer 2010
You were never my best friend.

A Thousand Faces and One

I'm a good guesser.

I guess what people are feeling and what they mean and I'm always right.

Except, I don't ever say anything.

You wouldn't know it, but I'm a good guesser.

I knew that when you were angry and wouldn't let people do what they wanted, it wasn't just because you'd had a bad day.  You'd had a bad several years.

I knew that when you left for the not last time, you weren't weak.  You were craving and you still are.

I knew that when he asked you a normal question and you said you wouldn't answer, you were remembering every feeling you'd ever had at one moment and the force was enough to take you out of this world.

I knew that when you got upset, it wasn't a random heart string because you knew exactly which one was pulled.

Just as I know that the strings being tugged in my own heart have stretched and collapsed so many times, I stopped keeping count.

My heart is tired and I am tired and I am a good guesser, but you wouldn't know it.

Because I see the way you hide your face, thinking that no one actually knows.  

I see the way you cry, not for forgiveness, but for your own stupidity.  

I see the way you look at him and feel disgusted and not just by the scars he holds.

I see the way you roll your eyes, like, superficial, but it's actually seven fathoms deep.

Because I have known these things and maybe not at your longevity, but enough to taste the bitter that comes with it and enough to know that I'm a good guesser.

Pins and Needles

A slice through the thick of your skin
cannot stop the rain from taking all of the air.
Just as lying in the bed you made
cannot warm up your 0 degree body.

And I'm pretty sure there's a mouse living in my closet.
I hear him and sometimes feel him
and I just wish he'd disappear
because I can't stand the sounds of something living.

No, the signs of life in my bedroom once again
only makes it harder to think
and worse for the imagination
and hard on the lungs.

What I really want is to lie here
and hold onto myself
in the silence,
alone.

Because although I don't need you
to keep my heart pumping,
I want you to be the one to
make it work once again.

Darling, We've Hit Rock Bottom

"She is deceased."

I never believed in the voice overs when a sentence said would plague a character over and over again.
But these three words said by Officer Shidome were so effortless, I can't help but keep hearing them.  I hear them all the time.  I don't even remember what her voice sounds like, but these three words have piled up in my brain and I see it in block letters and I get this strange feeling in my stomach and chest and throat.

And maybe at this point, you're all worried that I lost my mom or a sister or whatever.   But my mom is upstairs on the computer right now, and I've never had a sister.

No, I'm talking about my freaking dog.  And if you're laughing at this point, you're a heartless, soulless bitch (or bastard, whichever you prefer).

I mean, you probably think it's freaking ridiculous that I've cried everyday for the past week over my dog's death.  You're probably thinking, 'It's not like it's a human.  It'd be bad if it was a human.  I could understand if it was a human.'

But you will never get it, unless you have or have had one of these selfish bitches (pun intended) yourself.
Like, get this:  These little monsters freaking love you unconditionally.  We use that phrase so much, I think it's lost every meaning.  So just think about it.  Unconditionally.  Like, you could throw them off the Empire State building and they would still love you.  And then you just have to love them back.  There's no way out, I swear.

Okay, so then you teach them how to do things like sit and roll over and play dead (but if you're me, you teach the latter by using the phrase 'avada kedavra').  Except, they're so freaking smart that they pick up different phrases you don't even teach them.  Like 'Say you're sorry.' or 'Go lay on your bed.'

And then they die in the stupidest way possible.  Like, in my case, they get hit by a car.  Seriously?  You didn't understand that the speeding, metal piece of shit could kill you?  It's a billion times your size.
(But not really because you weigh 50 pounds.)

And I'm in such a horrible place right now because I also loved my dog unconditionally.  I just kind of pretend it didn't happen so that I don't feel it.  Except, I find myself waiting for her to meet me at the door or watch me from the backyard or run down to my room at bedtime and escape under my bed.  So then it just hurts that much more.

See, she's messed me up so badly that I didn't cry when I read The Fault in our Stars.  It's a freaking book about kids with cancer that fall in love with each other and I didn't cry.  I couldn't freaking cry because I wasted all my emotion on this dumb animal.  I've shut out most feelings and it's bad and she's just a dog, but this is more than I can handle.

I'm just afraid that this was supposed to prepare me for something greater because I've never experienced what everyone considers real loss.

I'm sorry to those of you who have experienced real loss.  Because that must be infinitely worse than this.

Because if this isn't what everyone considers real loss, I don't want to find out what real loss is.