Her breath is heavy and woven with impatience.

I can’t help but feel her expectations.

Her need is drowning me. If I cared to look closer I would see that she’s drowning too.

I know I can never deliver all the comfort and reassurance she craves.

I can hear her speaking to me from somewhere within my body.

Her scent permeates my pores.

I hate her, for she makes me want to save her.

Her beautiful eyes, so deep, so lipid, so tortured beneath it all.

She’s sitting there – loving me.

Loving every single thing about me. Thinking about me every moment. Her presence is all at once around me like a fog.

I can no longer see or think clearly.

My head pounds with all the loved ones banished to the recesses of my mind.

I blame her, the blame is overwhelming. It cuts my skin, turning it gnarled and ugly. It never touches her.

She’s ethereal yet soaked with flaws. Mistakes and regret drip from her eyelashes.

She cries and my anger melts away.

I want so badly to touch the curve of her face. I’m frightened to sit too close – I know she’ll never let me go.

She’s hurt much too long-

She’s been fractured beyond repair-

Why can’t I look away from her face?

All at once I know, I’ll never leave.

I’ll never stop reaching for her, trying to lift her out of her deep pain. Never stop fighting every single shadow and ghost that haunts her. Night upon night.

And in the moment that the certainty of that thought occurs-

Dread and horror inevitably follow.

She has me now, I’m lost with her. I cease to be.

I should have refused to sit with myself.