Nelson, I Didn't Know How to Say it

Dear Nelson,

I wanted to say goodbye, but I didn't know how. I didn't know how to say those words with a smile glued on my face. Smiling like I was happy to go.

I don't know how to use the art of small talk effectively. I didn't know how to talk about the weather when I wanted to talk about heaven. I didn't know how to pretend that I wasn't scared.

I didn't know how to tell you how much this class meant without sounding like a kiss ass. Without telling you I wanted an A to hang on the refrigerator. I didn't know how to say I like writing. Without sounding like I was fishing for compliments.

I didn't know how to hold back the tears... Without wanting you to tell me it was okay to cry.
I didn't know how to hold back the tears without letting a few fall. Because the truth is, I'm scared of change.

I'm scared of the unknown. Of the hurt behind your scar. Of the person behind the mask. The number behind the variable. The punchline behind the joke.

I'm scared of smashing the spider in the locker room. Because I don't want God to kill me so thoughtlessly. I don't want God to crush me under his shoe. I don't want him to consider my life as meaningless. The meaningless life we grant the ant or the mosquito.

I'm scared of oblivion. I'm scared that if I am remembered, it will be for the wrong reasons. As the girl who shaved her head. As the girl who went away for a while. As the girl who couldn't get over her boyfriend.

I'm scared that you hate my favorite song. That every time you hear my favorite lyrics, you're laughing.
That you're making fun of this post.

I'm scared to say I'll miss this. I'll miss typing out the words that hurt to read. The words that make my mom cry, and not in a good way.

I'm scared to say "I'm scared." Out loud.

I'm scared to admit that it hurt when my mom cried last night. When she took one look at me and broke down. When she was cringing as I chopped off my hair.

It hurts when she says that I don't have feelings, that I'm cold. That I don't love her. That I don't care. But it's easier to pretend she's right. My feelings are uglier laid out on the kitchen table next to the centerpiece. My feelings aren't the bright colors that make up the rainbow or lead you to the pot of gold. They're the green-grays, and the purple-blacks.

I'm scared of pen. Of making mistakes. Of permanent marker. Of permanent things.

I gave her the razor but I didn't give her permission. I held my breath instead of saying "no." I'm sorry I told you to leave when I wanted you to stay, but don't think this whole letter is an apology.

I clicked "publish" when I wanted to click "publish." I should have touched "save." But the words wouldn't come to my head in enough time and God told me He wasn't ready for me to make those kind of decisions. Those impulsive ones.

And I did anyways.

I'm sorry if you hate my hair. If you hate my taste in music. My laugh.

Because I want to be one of the kids you remember for something good.

Love,
Me

Bricks and Bloodstains

Dear Life,

I can't decide whether you look better broken. I mean this as a compliment, you know.
I'm too afraid of cutting open my fingers on your sharp edges. On your shattered picture frames. I sliced open my fingertip with the page of the last year's yearbook. The page where someone wrote "bitch" next to my picture.

They lied. You're the devil. I'm too scared to put you back together.

If my fingers melt along with the super glue... People will know I'm trying. And it's more acceptable to pretend that I don't care where you're taking me. That I don't care about my grades or what college will accept my A- in physical education.

Let me tell you something. The newer brick houses aren't worth much to anyone. They're not the same quality of bricks. New bricks aren't photographed in black and white. It's the ones who have held up their walls for a hundred years. Those are the ones who have been through your snowstorms, your hurricanes, your floods. The shame, the graffiti, the abuse. The bricks that belong to the mature part of the city. The mature part of your heart that knows love is overrated.

It doesn't matter how long I stay here. How long it is before I give way. Before my walls crumble and my structure deteriorates. Before even the ghosts call me haunted.

Because no matter how long I stay, the rains will keep beating on the tin roof. The icicles will hang from the eaves. The cold and the dampness will find the unlocked windows. The bricks will be worn down time and time again. The water will weather the stones and the wind will erode your promises.

Mommy told me to stay strong. She told me that she's sending me away so I can get better.

But if I'm fixed... If my walls are mended, if the broken window is repaired, if the new door is refitted, people won't pay as much attention to me. When your house has been remodeled, you don't spend any more time investigating the cracks hidden beneath the new coat of paint. The reason for the draft. Your story has no value anymore. You're simply a survivor.

And I'm a house that's in the renovation process. The longer the cabinets take to get here, the longer you'll look. The longer you'll notice.

And when you're done, you'll admire my new roof. You'll say that I look "as good as new."

But this isn't the real me. You buried the real me beneath the charming new wallpaper and the unfamiliar carpet. You hid me beneath the facade. I felt more myself with the blood stains in the rug and the chipped paint. The wall nicked where it made contact with your Android. But the cell phone didn't break.

I broke instead. And maybe that was preferable. All you cared about was the cracked screen. Well you can still dial the fucking phone, so why do you care so much about appearance?

The cracked screen with its dried blood. But it wasn't the phone that was bleeding. It was me.

And the blood stains your vintage wallpaper from the inside out, so you plaster on more and more wallpaper to hide the hurt. But you still don't see that my heart is broken and my mouth is fixed shut with your cheery wallpaper. The plaster stops me from smiling, from speaking, from crying.

There's new bricks. The chipped ones, the scars... All were taken off the exterior and carelessly thrown into the church dumpster.

I fucking hate wallpaper.

Love,
Me

For You's Bedtime Story

This is "For You."

This is a love story.

Sometimes, he felt he would have preferred to leave this place. It didn't matter if you were a prince of a forgotten city in the middle of nowhere. His parents' faces were fading fast from his memory, and he couldn't quite recall what he was meant to do. To be. None of the aristocrats expected anything from the young man except that he wait at his golden castle until it killed him. He always felt like he was supposed to be something more than the boy peeking out from the front window and looking over his kingdom.

In this small town, everyone had their own agenda. The planets gathered around him at all the parties, but nobody ever came close. The other stars always insisted on having lunch at their place, and frankly, they were a little too high maitenance for him anyways. He would never be the biggest star in Hollywood, so he stuck to his corner of the universe.

He felt a little lost. He felt a little misunderstood.

The only resident with whom he could identify was an older man named Pluto. Ever since he had an affair with that asteroid, his title of "planet" was removed as was custom, and he spent the rest of his life an outcast. The two kept in touch, but even the Sun was apprehensive to get too close.

And then he saw Luna. That subtly feminine glow. They way she smiled in the darkness.

And the way she looked at him invited the prince to come closer.

The way she saw the potential of the human race. They way she said man's footsteps on her skin felt like a message from God. Her breakup with Earth, how he had called her cold and pockmarked. Scarred. How she had never felt loved the same way since.

The way she bit her lip when she was concentrating. The way she sobbed when she watched the Holocaust from above. The way she still painted with color. The way she painted with red and it didn't remind her of blood.

Her lips quivered when she was stuck in a crowd. She preferred to be hidden in the background... Unless it was night and she could comfort the lost children looking to the sky for help. He tried to make her laugh because he thought it was the prettiest sound he'd ever heard. The way she couldn't breathe when she laughed too hard. The way she wrote poetry.

And the way he felt so confident that he would make a difference. When he didn't realize all that he already did. His charisma. The way his laugh lit up a little something inside everyone. The way he wasn't scared to die. How he made her feel more exquisite than anything else in the solar system.

The way he listened to life. The way he wasn't afraid of breaking the rules. When he kissed every blemish, every imperfection on her skin and told her he loved her. The rebellious side. How he held her hand when she cried. The time he told her why. Why, why, why.

She shivered at his touch, even though she had never felt so warm.

And when they kissed, another star was born.

Affairs with Death Herself

You: The majority of college students can't afford therapy.

And how many serial killers are born in college?

Him: My name is Antoine. This is a confession.

Yes, I shot her.

Liked the look of fear in her eyes, to be honest. 

See, I was having an affair with Death. She is a beautiful girl, don't get me wrong, but yellow is NOT her color. There's a reason you always see her wearing black.

Each bullet I shot was a "How are you" question mark. Exclamation point. 

And she answered me with the death count in the newspaper.

Strangulation was the best compliment I could think of. 

And the dreams she filled my head with let me know that she understood.

Poison confessed the name of the last girl I loved. I slipped the powder into her drink and knew I was ready to give her up. I watched Anna's eyes close for the last time, and I kissed her forehead. Even though I knew it would cause an argument in the morning.

When Life and Death argued which of the two held the most influence, she wouldn't let me get involved. See, they disagreed whether it was more valuable to give birth to life or prevent life. But they did agree that humankind was one of God's most pitied experiments.

I wasn't offended.

She didn't count me among the humans.

Two weeks ago, I penciled my latest kill into my notebook, then I tore out the page and threw the crumpled confession into the fire where she could never be recovered.

I saw Death smile at this declaration of my love. I saw her tear up and reach for my hand. Don't tell me I didn't, because I SAW it.

I know there's not a heaven. There's too many stories about it for it to be anything more than a bedtime story. The type used to reassure kids they'll see their mommy again someday. I don't think so. It isn't that easy. The truth is something you have to make a concentrated effort to find.

I told her I wasn't afraid to die. That didn't mean I was ready.

Yes, she filled my head with fantasies about what it would mean when we were finally together. Yes, I hung myself. Yes, it hurt like all the bedtime stories tell you it doesn't. And then a numbness crept over me like sleep.

No one kills themselves because they want to die. They kill themselves desperate for the pain to stop. I wanted to know what it felt like when you couldn't feel. When your nerves were so damaged, feeling was no longer possible.

Wanted to know if Death was peaceful like she whispered to me over and over. I wanted to know if she had a fake profile on that Internet dating site. If she was who she said she was. How much botox she'd had done, and if she really looked alright for being old as dust. Literally. I'd always had a bit of a thing for older women.

When I hung myself, I wanted to know what kind of words that translated to. I wanted to tell her I loved her in words meaningful enough.

Wanted to know if the "kiss" of Death was all it was cracked up to be.

I'll be honest. I think I liked kissing Anna better. 

I liked feeling warm lips better than cold lips on my throat.
I liked talking without all the fucking metaphors.

Think I liked loving more than I liked being loved.

Think I liked Death when she was a concept rather than the chick sleeping next to me.

I should've dated Life instead. Death is the uglier twin, and I like red hair better than black.

I think regrets mean less when you're living and more when you're dead.

And how do I tell her this now?

You: Is that all you would like to confess?

Shut up and tell me your favorite ice cream flavor.

I wanted to be telling the truth when I told you that I hated you, but the lie detector stopped me and suggested that I might love you instead.

I was too scared of that word, love, so I dragged my father's axe out of the garage for the first time. I'll leave the graphic scene up to you.. Then the metal arms reach for you as the head lies disconnected on the cement. Oops.

I never thought that I would be writing a letter to you before I emailed you, but sometimes, that's what romance is.

 Sometimes skinny dipping in the ocean cleans you off better than a shower. Somehow your lips look more kissable when you have a girlfriend. And somehow, I think you get better looking the more hours we waste in silence on the phone.

That's what love is. It's all these damn contradictions.

If you were an ice cream flavor, you would be vanilla. Not because you're bland, but because you're reliable. The grocery store never runs out of vanilla. You're no special edition, no low-fat bullshit, but you get the job done.

You go well with my whipped cream and rainbow sprinkles, but hey, so does everyone else. The difference is, I chose you. You can be the ice cream to my toppings, but you'll never be the surprising one out of the two of us.

You have that old-school vibe with your vintage pocketwatch and that sweater vest you wear when it's ninety outside. I laugh when you want me to. But sometimes, I laugh even when you don't want me to. Like when you ask me for help picking out clothes.You might have more class than a thrift shop, but you sure as hell don't have swag.

And when I get tired of speaking in English, and I want to speak in poetry or metaphors instead... you'll blow me off and tell me that we live nowhere near an ocean.

That's the point, you idiot.

You're the Great Salt Lake because you're a wannabe. Indian Ocean ain't calling because you're trying too hard to be anorexic and the Pacific ignores you because you have more sparkle than the rest of 'em.

But I love exceptions to the rule, and that you are, darling.

You're the only boy who talked about things that mattered. As well as things that didn't.

And I was waiting for you to hear me out, but when I turned to see the thoughts tumbling through your head, I couldn't even make out where your footprints had been beside me. And even though you didn't listen to me while I prayed at your feet, I keep running towards you.

Maybe I swore because I wanted to see if you loved me enough to keep listening, even if your bishop and your old bones told you to turn away. I wanted you to love me more than you liked me. And I never said you had to like me, even when I gave you the five senses. I'm not as pretentious as God.

Love is not expecting the words back that were borrowed. Love is checking your pockets while you're getting mugged, contributing all your forgotten pennies to the cause. Love is using Internet Explorer instead of Chrome, even if it might take ten minutes longer to get to the Google homepage. Love is kissing every scar on her wrist, even if the emotions bruise your lips. Love is two primary colors holding hands to make something new. Love is purchasing a song for $1.29 when you could just as easily download it free of charge. Love is the taste of sweat and blood. Love is thinking about you in turquoise. Love is poison. Love is the cure.

Because the truth is... I'm thinking about you like keyboards think about fingers, like black thinks about white, like opposites attract, and like the guitar thinks about the way you toy with her heart.

I'm thinking about you like stripes think about curves, like Ben and Jerry stay awake thinking up the newest ice cream flavor, like Romeo thought that he couldn't live without his Juliet. I'm thinking about you like my composition book thinks about the pens that mark up her memories. Like algebra thinks about finding her x. I think about you like Troy thinks about Vanessa, and like East High School thinks about its five minutes of fame.

I'm thinking about you like lips think about kissing, like Robert Smith thinks about Mary Poole, and like you think about your Homecoming date. I'm thinking about you like I think about God. And how I don't know whether I belong in heaven or hell, but at least hell has some personality. I'm thinking about you like I won't stop.

And dear Love, you've screwed me over enough. So please allow me this one boy with the blue eyes. Let me look back on our first kiss without having to close off my heart from feeling too hard and loving too much. Let me prove my mother wrong and let me get married in ten years. Please. Love, let me pray you stop feeling bitter about what Rejection did to you. Let me kiss you on the lips and tell you that you're beautiful. I don't know exactly what you look like, but you sure have a nice personality. So maybe you make a grand entrance with your silver ballgown and you win back your Prince Charming.

And maybe by then, you'll feel generous enough to share.

You ran away with Childhood and the Princess.

Dear Imaginary Friend,

You didn't have to move off to Idaho and get married at the age of six. You aren't allowed to have a mid-life crisis for at least ten more years. Or, at least that's what my sister told me when she was sixteen.

It isn't true, you know. About teenage years. I still have the same eyes and I like chocolate milk (even though it's almond milk now). We can stay up late under my covers, reading novels with a flashlight like we used to. We can fill notebooks with all the nonsense in our heads. We're the most recognized celebrities in the playroom, so Barbie and Ken are jealous of us. Especially the Hannah Montana Barbie doll who took off all her clothes and made a scene at the VMA's. You were lucky you were in Idaho for that performance.

 I bet I have a box of crayons tucked away in some drawer.

I think I had a crush on you. Or maybe you had a crush on me. But we all know princes are only allowed to marry princesses and so I could not fit in your castle by the mailbox. But we'll be okay. You got your princess, and I'll go kidnap some prince someday (Contrary to popular belief, I'm not sitting around waiting for him to show up).

Happy news: We finally got a dog. She's five pounds. The stereotypical skinny white bitch (Haha). I know the parental units pinkie-promised I could get one when I was seven. But true to form, it happened about eight years later. It's better than the pet worms we used to keep in a tupperware container in the upstairs bathroom. You know, the ones we named after our favorite desserts. Brownie, Cupcake, Cookie, Kit Kat...

Remember when I introduced you to Bria and Anna? You were shy and didn't show yourself to them. But I didn't care what they thought about us, as long as we could go to McDonald's together for the Happy Meals. Even when my dad forgot to take off your seatbelt and left you. Grown-ups...

You hit me once. Boys aren't supposed to hit girls. But I forgave you, you know. You didn't have to run away and take your castle by the mailbox with you. You took Childhood with you.

In case you didn't know, calling you is as pointless as calling Childhood herself. She was nicer than you, and she still won't pick up her phone. Or write me back. She says she has "moved on."

We used to be on speaking terms, you know. We used to be... best friends. But she did leave me with some wisdom stored in an abstract corner of my brain. Like when the teacher asked if Sally had two cookies and you took away two, it didn't matter the number she had left. What mattered was that Sally was on the verge of crying, and you had to share your cookies with her if you didn't want her tears to ruin the mural you were working on.

Or that you shouldn't eat dirt because it wasn't "ladylike" (what she means to say is it got stuck in your teeth).

But she's gone and you're gone.

Yesterday, I traded in my calculus textbook for a box of twelve crayons. I didn't care if my math teacher didn't like it. My math teacher and Childhood weren't just avoiding each other's phone calls. They were enemies. The number seventeen x looked a lot prettier in the color red, and I am sure she gained some self-confidence too. When you're a grown up, all you mention about the girls in our neighborhood is their looks and their self-confidence. I think it should be a rule that you ask them instead how many minutes they can hula-hoop without letting it drop to the floor or how many freckles they have on their nose. Those are the interesting things anyway.

Let's get to the point of this letter. You know what it is, don't you? So one day I locked you and Childhood and my first grade teacher in my basement. I threatened that I wouldn't let you go until I was a kid again. And the teacher gave me the sad, grown-up smile that they give when they know something you don't. And Childhood smirked and gave some sarcastic remark. And you looked at the carpet and were quiet. I'm sorry. I bet you missed your princess.

So I handed you all a crayon in your favorite color. You drew a purple schoolbus on the wall before my parents saw, and the three of you climbed aboard and didn't say goodbye even if you were thinking it. And that's the last time I saw you. And my mom forced me to scrub off the crayon that you left behind. She thinks washing away a memory is the same thing as washing a wall. Grown ups...

Sometimes, it isn't that easy.

And sometimes I wish it was.

Sincerely,

Your lost child

P.S. If you made up the rumor that Bill Nye died last year, it wasn't funny.

The Spiderman is Having Us for Dinner Tonight.

You really are too damn beautiful when you lie to me. Even your fingernails look like paper.

But I still drink it all in, like Alice breathes in the Cheshire cat's magenta painted voice.
And sometimes I just want to eat you up, you fragile little thing.

The Spiderman is having us both for dinner tonight, you know. Robert Smith whispered it to me across the universe and a couple years and the groupies who look more like The Cure than The Cure looks like The Cure. P.S. We won't be able to watch the sunset tomorrow at the old folks' home like we promised George. Because this night is the last one.

And for our last night, we can write letters to our lost loves in crayon and colored marker.

We can steal innocence from Walmart along with a pack of gum.

And we can send our iPhones down the river along with our left shoes and dead plants.

We can shower off the regret and watch it as it shyly heads down the drain... But we'll still regret the night we didn't go to that concert, and we could have.

And you still might pray that you didn't date that man who taught you what a cig stub burned into your forearm smells like. The man who made you question if you should really forgive seven times seventy and if Jesus was right about everything he said in that book you keep on your bedside table.

We can pretend we got wise and write an advice column for the local paper.

Or cross off everything on our bucket list even if we haven't completed it yet. To make ourselves feel like we lived life right and we didn't beckon death until the clock threatened to strike midnight in the ballroom.

We can knit like old ladies in movies to make ourselves feel old. Or we can cry about how young we think we are and how the wrinkles crept up on us. How we still thought we were dressing in the latest fashions until I looked at the latest issue of Vogue in March.

We can run until our hearts race each other down the block alongside us.

We can lie down in the wet grass, legs touching, and listen to the cries of the dead moths which you drowned in the sink. Until we feel all the emotions we never wanted to. You killer.

We can count down the minutes like New Year's Eve and pretend.

We can rewrite our history and make up new first kiss stories thousands of miles away. Your first kiss was on the Eiffel tower with the French swim instructor. Remember? The one we all had crushes on as thirteen-year-olds before we knew he was gay. You lucky duck.

Laugh like life was not as misunderstood as she carried on, because she wasn't.

Breathe memories instead of oxygen.

Or we can pretend that we'll live forever and that we'll see that obnoxious dog of yours barking his goddamn head off when the mailman stops by tomorrow.

I like the last one.

What This is About.

This is about when you fall asleep at night, and you never wake up. And no matter how many times they plug you into the wall and recharge you, they can't bring you back to life.

This is about when they keep trying to dig into your brain to speed up your internal processing unit.

This is about when you would rather cry because of the tragedy of your greatest love story, of the world's greatest love story, than stop feeling.

This is about when you love the broken things, and they keep beating you to the ground until you admit that you denounce the flawed, and that you confess you only worship the perfect. Even though you never did think these things. Until you couldn't think of anything but wanting the pain to stop.

This is about when your hard drive is broken and you can't remember the first time your father promised he wouldn't hit you again. When you can't remember your first memory.

This is about when you never got over the girl who said that one thing in that one place when you were ten. Or the first boy who called you fat in middle school.

This is about night terrors, showers when you're half asleep, and praying to your own version of Steve Jobs.

This is about your first bra fitting, the kid who proposed to you in preschool, and dreams about girls when you're supposed to like boys. Youre nOT followinG the PRogram. The owner's manual doesn't apply to you anymore, and honestly, you couldn't care less about the goddamn owner's manual. Let the next guy figure you out himself, like boys have to figure out girls. Like girls have to figure out what they're "supposed" to look like based on fashion magazines and the world wide web.

This is a criticism of the robot race. This is a criticism of mankind and how "far" we've come.

This is about therapists ("and how do you feel about that?"), about learning to walk in high heels, and having to brush your teeth.

Or maybe it's not about you having to brush your teeth.

Maybe it's about me having to brush mine.