All My Ghosts
Our shadows trail along the flickering coolers, fluorescent bulbs lighting our way. I follow you like a lost puppy, hands always outstretched towards yours. You hold my hand tightly and I try not to question the security. You intertwine our fingers behind your back and I press our fate lines against each other. I pray they align with what is written in the stars for us. Others have held my hand with the same ferocity and love and let go with the same sureness you hold my hand with now. I tug your hand to pull you back against my chest, arms wrapped tightly around your waist. Don’t change your mind, I think. I let you go and you don’t hesitate to turn and face me. You smile and I squeeze your hand. Interlocked and it feels like fate.
We sit in your car. Yellow lights bounce off your tortoise shell frames. I try not to stare. I want to, though. I want to follow the lines of your face and memorize each laugh line and freckle. I force myself to look forward. [Don’t linger on what you might lose.] Unwavering eyes stare into the red light ahead. You reach out to hold my hand and I melt alongside the slushy in the cupholder. You read me with your eyes closed and it terrifies me. Others have read these pages before and gotten tired of my story. You don’t seem to bore of me and I hold my breath waiting for the chapter that breaks you. The sentence that’s too much. The cruel thought that pushes you away. You tell me this won’t happen and I want to believe you. I’ve believed others before you but their words still slipped off the page, my love for them weighing them down. I don’t want to weigh you down, I think. I snap back into my body as your foot connects with the accelerator. Memories flood my ears and slip out the cracks of the windows. The night air rushes past us, scents of magnolias and sea-salt fill the car. I turn to look at you and you’re already looking at me. You seem to always be looking to me and I fear you’ll get tired of the view. You smile and I nod. Unspoken and it feels true.
You take my hand, pulling me into your arms in the empty living room. Our shoes clatter against the wooden floor and I look up to you, wrapping my arms around your neck. You sway me to imaginary melodies and I let myself lean into you. Your phone vibrates in your pocket against my thigh and I try not to let the darkness cloud my vision. My thoughts jump from one storm cloud to another, lightning bolts setting fires inside of me. The thunder in my mind grows and I can’t hear or see you clearly anymore. On the surface it feels hot to the touch but digging deeper I see the unhealed wound. I instinctively blame you for these old wounds, knowing your arrows have never pierced anything but my heart tenderly. This fear is raw and reactive. It’s not the flashes of familiar hands caressing your skin, nor the scenarios I’ve concocted of you falling for fresh eyes. They sting but they aren’t real. My imagination runs wild but she runs free with fiction. Here, in this reality with you, they don’t hold up. But my fears? Those are the salt that I mash into these wounds. Those are real and I feel them through to my core. The fear that with every kiss and every I love you, there’s more to lose. I’ve never loved so openly and freely and there’s so much at stake at the precipice with you. But you touch your forehead to mine and lock your eyes with mine. You smile, unaware of the storm building inside me, and I close my eyes. Longing and it feels like nothing I’ve felt before.
I fall from the edge of this cliff and you catch me in your arms, folding into sky blue comforters and satin pillowcases. We dim the lights and I bury my face in your chest, inhaling aromas of amber and tobacco. Too scared to face my ghosts that linger in the corners of my room; faceless people and echoes of love lost. I struggle to put words to the hollow feeling that fills me; the hollowness feels deserving but with no foundation to build this belief upon. I rattle my brain for ways to explain the disconnection I fall into as protection. There’s no rhyme or reason for this emptiness that’s been carved into the cavity of my chest. I hold back the urge to prune the flowers that are beginning to grow within me. They feel familiar and foreign at the same time; wanting to avoid the cuts and scrapes of love’s thorns but wanting to get close enough to catch a scent of this sweet love. You hold my fingertips against their stems, no thorns against the ridged surface. You place petals in my palm and wait quietly for me to clasp them. You sit patiently in the garden and sit with me as the flowers bloom. I tilt my eyes to look at you, letting myself linger. You smile and I smile back. Reciprocated and it feels right.
