post traumatic stress.

i make a move just before i have a chance to think better of it. later, i know i'm going to have to figure out a clever strategy in which i don't second-guess myself.

i hope you weren't waiting for a mission statement. there's a definite feeling of awkwardness to all this, and i wouldn't want to ruin it by tacking on some kind of life lesson or moral to the story. it gets physical, sort of. i don't mean to mislead, though. the physicality of it is pretty abstract; it's an airy feeling of anxiousness in my chest or a weird pang from the bottom of my gut that spreads out, feels warm and tingly. makes my fingers go numb.

i'm sitting on the couch across from her, and she's acting like she's in shock. maybe i'm acting the same way, and i lose track of the conversation for a second thinking about it. she rarely makes any eye contact, and if she does it seems as if by accident. her head is just sort of lolling around as she talks in monotone and stares off into space, occasionally meeting my gaze for a split second, then drifting off again.

she just talks in circles and it stirs up a strange feeling of paranoia in me. it's because i know she's going crazy and i'm afraid that maybe i am too. she's recounting the events of the previous week, restating things, sometimes four or five times. it doesn't take long for me to realise that she's telling herself, if only to try to make sense of everything.

i can relate, oddly. not because i've ever been in her position before, but rather i think that i've caused it in the past. and what do you do with that? i tell myself i can't worry about it too much, because i'll just end up back in my head again. i won't be much use to anyone there.

instead of doing anything decisive i just roll a cigarette and look around the room, occasionally realising that i've fixed my stare on a camera or a chair or something. she keeps talking and i keep listening, but anything i can think of to try to help her just makes me feel ugly and strange.

and then she's fallen on her knuckles and there's a little bit of blood, but mostly i can't stop looking at the frightened look in her eyes. my hand is on her back, and suddenly she turns and glares at me. she looks very alert, and her eyes let me i really shouldn't have done that. i smile a little bit because i know that there's not a lot i can do to salvage the situation. there's comfort and familiarity in that.

before i've finished the thought she's vomited on my floor. cleaning it up will probably distract us for a few minutes, which is oddly exciting. even though she's the one who's vomiting i feel better than i have all night as i carry her to the bathroom and get some towels.

the night.

and the lights got loud. i followed you out to the porch fumbling with a cigarette and digging around in my pockets. the party inside continued but the sliding glass doors were fogging up and pretty soon it was just you and me and the mosquitoes and that was fine.

i'd almost forgotten the feeling of lust that crept up on me then, having spent so much time being in the relationship that i really had no idea what it meant. that's probably a bad thing but i never thought about it much, so i guess ignorance was bliss.

you were wearing something low-cut and frilly around the chest but not to a ridiculous extent. and there was a skirt which really showed off your hips, but not so much the shape of them as how they moved. you brushed up against me and i caught a scent of something and then my mind went crazy and i forgot all about the loud party inside the fogged doors. there was just some greenish fluorescent light on a humid evening and you and i smelling like wine and a little bit of sweat.

i started to wonder why i was still seeing you if it wasn't like this all the time anymore. i looked from your cracked red toenail polish surrounded by sandals, smooth calves and then all the way up to red lips and thought i really didn't have it so badly.

i leaned over the porch railing and hit my cigarette and asked you to come sit by me, knowing you would and thinking that you and i were far past the exciting part. it was really too bad. if i could do it again right now i'd drop everything.

i said, 'the night's starting to cool off.' you nodded, looked at me for a second, and we kissed. it didn't last very long, but that was fine with me.

here i go.

snap your fingers and watch as you fall back onto your couch, count the cigarettes throughout the day, note the smooth way you back feels as it lines up with the cushion and do your best not to remember anything. brought back into the now and reeling just a little bit at the slow transition like, hey, here it is again. there's a math to it, there's a feeling like a face pressed against the pane and you are always moving for some unseen audience, knowing you've already done enough to win them over. knowing you've done it once before. count the four breaths, seven seconds, pick up the phone and exhale.

no more cobblestone poems, no more cold comforts or indecisions hanging limply like a wreath around your neck. no need to recount your recent midnight walk or the way your fingers brushed your hips, no consideration for the significance of this.

this is no ode to anyone else, it doesn't account for any absense, it's just the feeling of sitting with sandals on a porch and being drunk throughout the day. it's the part where things haven't gone so far over the hill that you can't maintain contact, make amends, catch your breath. knowing what's happening in a month won't help, so don't worry about that either.

you're sitting on a stack of cash and considering a plethora of different locales lined with palm trees and drinks with lime and that's good enough to get you started, convince you to go wash the dishes and put some sandals on, because goddamn it sure took long enough.

sitting in a text file

along with all the rest of my ambitions is a story entitled pie part three, overturned, on the floor with a melted processor, sitting nicely filed away on a harddrive rendered inaccessible.

and all the cords leading to and fro have been disconnected, covered in dust, rearranged, atrophied and made useless over the course of a week or so. and then

the sun came out and ignoring the death of my computer was not such a difficult task anymore. so i've got this notebook and i've been writing longhand, mostly poetry and certainly nothing worthy of being posted here.

but hey, maybe when i'm dead you can look forward to reading a mediocre re-hashing of my current works. if anyone is ambitious enough to post it for my ~10 avid readers. but don't be discouraged. you guys are very avid. oh yes.