I turned my back on you. That’s what I did. I sort of spun on my heel, as if introducing a dance that I had no intention of finishing. That’s what I did. Had we been in a movie, I would have looked over my shoulder to see you watching me walk away. This was not a movie; you never watch me walk away. I turned on my heel, dramatically, for nothing. I felt the grinding of the sidewalk against the bottom of my shoes for no good reason. The sensation felt empty. I shrugged. I shrug at facts.
There was this haziness over head, a golden reverberation against an already dimly lit sky, and I took it as a notice; I took it as my gunshot against the sound of us shuffling along on the ground; earth bound for the moment. And when I knew you were out of sight, I ran. I ran as fast as I could, and when I stumbled, I laughed; and when my legs gave out and I tumbled to the ground ripping a hole in my flesh, I got up and kept moving. I couldn’t tell you my intention; I couldn’t even tell myself. All I knew was I was trying to out run you; I was trying to beat you at the game you had been winning for too long.
The length of Houston is longer than it looks on a map, and I was out of breath before I reached Broadway; I was out of gumption before I woke up that morning. My shoes were not made for this; my heart was not prepared for this tactic, but still I brought my knees up with each inhale and let them pound against the cement with each exhale; and the balls of my feet ached before I reached Sullivan.
And I couldn’t tell you if you asked me why; and I couldn’t draw it on a map if you begged for a sketch, and if you asked what these scars meant, I’d probably lie, and the places in which I stash you for safe keeping are these parts of me of which I hate best (I hate best)… and I’d lie about them, too.
It was somewhere around Sixth Avenue where I noticed the sky was no longer golden, but more pink – the west side glows pink. It was somewhere around Greenwich that I realized I was bleeding from parts of me that were not bleeding when I started. I was somewhere around the West Side Highway when I seriously considered making a break for it. And the parked cars were louder than the ones that moved, the people who stood on the pier in silence were louder than my breath that gasped for recognition.
The problem was this: I had had an emotional morning is all. I had not woken up on the right side of the bed; I had forgotten to set my alarm clock; I had realized too much before noon, and it was easier to blame you for it all than stab at the parts of me I love best and condemn them for having existed in the first place.
If only I could terminate you on command; if only I could bring you back from the dead when I was done; if only I knew the way to implant myself inside you like a mad scientist, the kind you see in old movies, the kind covered in ketchup for effect and the ones who are full of heart but half of a brain… yes, that would do.
I don’t have ketchup in my refrigerator; and that mad scientist apron, well, I left it on the hanger in New Hampshire. But I remember the way you feel inside me, and I remember the way it felt to rest my fingertips against your spin in a makeshift tent for the hiding. However, had I been a mad scientist, this would not be an issue, the reason to run, that is…
I would have stood over a caldron knee-deep in sewage and magic; I would have contrived, as the best scientists do, a reason, or at the very least an excerpt from a foreign text that only 2 of us understand. That’s what I would have done.
I lost you somewhere between 11pm and next year; I lost you in the cushions that have long stopped being comfortable… cushions are sometimes replaced with worn down broken springs, the ones I used to love, and the ones that now leave me bruised with every turn. We don’t put couches out to pasture, but maybe we should.
I turned my back on you. That’s what I did. I was tired, you see; and my morning, well it was not something not worth mentioning. Instead, I did this thing where I spun on my heel as if introducing a dance, I had no intention of finishing… but you stopped leading me months ago, so there was no point anyway. And I looked up at the sky, that was some sort of golden, as if ripped from a comic book, where I’m not the heroine, and I knew… it was the parts of me I hate best.
At least now I’ve confirmed the importance of parked cars, the way they stand there and reflect life, as I heard them making sounds the entire way west. I am not a parked car, and neither are you, and that is the problem.
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