I ran down the street and kept running into the cool, dense early spring fog until I could no longer see The House behind me.
I’d gone out to my car which sat sadly in the driveway, determined to bring Elizabeth’s jacket into The House. She’d let me hold onto it for a little longer because I liked the way it smelled. On the drive back to her house I obstinately claimed it smelled just like her. She sighed in annoyance, convinced it was just her detergent I enjoyed. Paula, my neighbor who lives at the top of the hill above Vickers, has a tree growing in her yard which blocked my view of the pale white moon. I vacantly walked to the end of the long gravel driveway to clear Paula's tree, eventually standing underneath the moon so it could taunt me from its carefree position far away in the sky. I paced back up the driveway to my old red car, turning my head as I did so to catch another look at the dark above me. It was the same dark that Elizabeth might've found interesting enough to look at. Maybe at the same time as me. The passenger seat’s headrest gave off the smell of Elizabeth’s conditioner. I picked up her faded black jacket, cradling it, pressing it to my face, quietly wondering why I’d been coerced into spending the night away from her again in favor of painful routine. I looked at The House behind me. Nobody’ll miss me for a few more minutes. I started my walk down the driveway again, clutching Elizabeth’s jacket to my chest in discomfort as loose chunks of asphalt hit the sides of my feet. Wind brushed against my cheeks. I moved with determination towards the end of the block as if I were expecting to find her waiting for me. I thought of nothing else but her, me, and desperation–it is a distinctly sinking feeling which hasn’t come over me in months because I’ve habitually refused to recognize the life I wish I had. That life is nauseatingly close; nauseating because no matter how determined I’ve been, it’s unreachable tomorrow or the day after. I ran further and felt the sharp edges of pebbles press into my heels, embedding themselves into thick calloused skin. At the end of Vickers there was nowhere else to go but home or into the busy street in front of me. There were no friends that would let me stay with them for a few days who could watch over me while I sorted through thoughts, nobody to split rent with five different ways so I could take back the idea of life. I waited on the curb calmly, holding tightly onto the jacket. It was better to hold onto something familiar and feel the cold on my thinned arms than wear the jacket Elizabeth had on all day as she enjoyed different facets of life that I cannot. As I walked back home I dragged my feet through an overwhelming amount of shame. I struggled to unlock the front door as usual, and as I did so, I hoped nobody was waiting behind it for me. In my bedroom there was no leftover light shining through my dirty window from the streetlamp which has watched over me night after night since my father moved us into The House sixteen years ago. I quietly shut my bedroom door and opened the old window next to my bed. The window creaked loudly under the weight of the wall it was shoved into; the painful sound it made being the one loud noise which was permissible to disturb the ominous quiet which fills The House. I use my allowance wisely every night. I stood stiffly in front of the full length mirror which had been nailed to the wall behind my door, thinking about how Lizzy’s hands had been comfortably in my hair last Tuesday. My necklace had tangled, the clasp made itself difficult to find, and I thought about how I wanted her there to take my necklace off every night so I didn’t have to struggle with one more thing. I thought about how she’d likely kiss the back of my neck right at the nape or rest her chin on the top of my head to say something slightly stupid as she unclasped the delicate silver chain. I’d hear her laugh about it to herself in my ear. I want someone to take strain away from me because I lack the strength to do what is necessary to achieve completely on my own. I’d release everything to that someone without complaint, and to my benefactor all I’d have to give are the many apologies I’d be compelled to make when I came clean about the various sins I’ve committed against others who do not love me. I'd do so in hopes that they would fix that for me too. I wished I didn’t have reasons to say no to the ease she could provide in the various ways I find myself forced to. I want to enjoy her while she’s still around. Lingering wanting appeared as it usually does around midnight. In the blue light of my small shared bathroom I brushed my hair mindlessly, simply looking for ways to fill the time. Every night gets later and every morning earlier until I run out of hours and wait all day to sleep so deeply that I miss my alarm for the next week and forcibly allow the cycle to repeat itself from the beginning. I tugged on the purple bags which sank into my cheeks and watched bloodshot veins consume the whites of my eyes the longer I kept my thinned eyelids pried open. I sat down at my desk with my knees forcibly pushed to my chest and opened the tenth book I’d tried to get through this month, once again unable to focus on the skillfully coherent arrangement of words in front of me because my mind felt like an empty room. I thought about how Lizzy was once a stranger, quickly correcting myself because she’ll always be a little bit of a stranger which is what keeps the sickening, stifling sameness of existence at bay. Again I sat, wringing my thumbs out nervously and worried the longer she knows me, the more settled into the idea of us she becomes, the less exciting I will be.
She will start to dread the stale task of seeing me almost every day.
I’d be driving home from work one night, harboring the pleasant thought that I’d get to see her in two more hours, when my phone would let off the bright ring I set for her calls. “I’m on my way!” I’d yell over the static coming from my car’s broken radio. “I don’t think we should see each other.” “Tonight? That’s okay, I can try to make tomorrow work instead,” I would say with overly-earnest enthusiasm. Elizabeth would sharply inhale, “No. I don’t think we should keep seeing each other. I love you, I’ve been trying my best…” I’d feel my face stiff up like it does when I’m scared, only hearing the gist of what she said for the next three minutes; a short amount of time to reflect what she must’ve thought I was worthy of. Her reason for leaving would be something to do with a sameness that I couldn’t remember continuously exuding. With my voice cracking under the strain of realizing how ingrained into myself I’d allowed her to become, I would let her hang up the phone first for the last time. I’d think about my sin in silence on the rest of the way home, wondering if my friends were right in warning me against my idea of love. I’ve always been a firm believer in a love that is whole and enveloping. I enjoy my independence but to share almost everything with someone I see as an extension of myself would make life more enjoyable. On that hypothetical night traffic would be terrible as usual. I would loosely hold my phone as I sat in a line of cars, scrolling through my call history, counting each time I found her name. 25, 36, 47…that’s so many, I’d angrily say under my breath. At home I’d be coldly greeted like I was tonight by the sameness she’d accuse me of perpetrating. I’d sink into it because I should have remembered all I have is the routine of myself.
In my room framed by pale yellow walls I shrugged off my sweater and loose jeans that I’d poorly attempted to fit onto my waist by using safety pins; too cheap in every sense of the word to invest anything into learning an actual skill that could fix the problem. I replaced both articles of clothing with Lizzy’s jacket which cleverly covered the entirety of my torso and grazed the top of my hips. My knees gave away and I felt my back hit the floor I’d been standing slumped over. I took two sharp breaths in and exhaled one long one to empty my lungs. Three deep breaths, I reminded myself. On my third I let out a sob, not a cry. I sobbed over the sameness I’d accidentally stuck myself in which had been allowed to fester unchecked. I sobbed over the thought that I missed her more than she missed me and that the scenario in which she left me that I played out in my head continuously was likely coming within the next few months. Hot, salty tears ran down my face stinging the acne on my chin I’d been picking open all day. I wished Elizabeth–the one I knew when we still liked each other–were there to gingerly wipe the tears away. She was gentle with me in the ways that matter. In my head whined what she’d whispered the night I confronted her with the reality of commitment: All in good time. Was that supposed to comfort me? Remind me of the seriousness of the playfully morbid sentences I’d quietly spoken to her? Or was it meant to serve as an omen, reassuring me I would still somehow be pushed into the complete independence of routine I am used to? I rolled over onto my side, pushing an arm further into my ribs so my elbow might have a chance to bruise a soft spot. My phone that’d been thrown onto my bed buzzed expectantly. It was eleven o’clock, time for her to text me once a day, asking the same questions she always did, calling the routine meaningful conversation whenever the situation called for such a boldly false statement. I picked my torso up off the ground, slouching over the bright phone screen, vividly remembering how she used to sweetly reach for my hands to help me up. I closed my eyes and smiled at the pout she'd look down at me with whenever I didn't take her hand. This is a type of same, I thought to myself. I dutifully answered her string of exactly four texts as I did every night.
“How are you?” “I’m okay,” to which I added on details of the day until I’d written a short paragraph that I knew Lizzy wouldn’t read. “Great.” “How was your day?” “It was fine. I’ve got to go. Talk tomorrow?” “Alright. I love you.” “Love you.”
Ten minutes later I was swiping through the few pictures I have of her and me that she’d allowed me to collect whenever she was in a good mood. Once I got to the same picture I stopped at every night, I cried more. It was a silent, violent cry that I let out into my yellow-stained pillowcase until everything became the black which swallows me nightly in the sameness of trying to sleep.
