There’s something about the way you locked your eyes with mine, as if to show me how different things were, how i couldn’t hurt you anymore, how steady your guard would stand against me, when all i wanted you to know is how happy i was for you. Just something about it that makes me feel sad and excited and careful and honest all at the same time. Something about the way you quietly told me you love her, looking away from me and taking a drag of your cigarette as you did so, that made me miss so many people, miss feeling certainty, miss long nights in your apartment. And it was something about how you walked away, how we hugged goodbye, how you winked at me, as if to hint to the world our secret, that made me so much more aware of my mortality, of my innocence in the matter.

I just hope you make it to everywhere you want. That’s all I’m saying.

and it was really nice to see you.

I heard you’re all wifed up now. homie, what happened? who is she? i bet you’re so good to her, i bet you treat her like a queen. i just hope she appreciates everything. I guess that’s why I haven’t seen you lately, or maybe its my fault, but its crazy how much things can change in a few years. I want you to be okay, to be happy. but thats what everyone says i guess. 

i have this memory of us driving in your car at 6 or 7 in the morning. either i had dropped my car off? or you were picking me up? im not sure why i was in your car on that street or what either of us were doing before that but i do remember how the fog looked. and i remember it was sort of cold. but maybe thats because it was so early in the morning. you were driving silently while i was talking to you, telling you everything. you just drove through the fog and listened without interrupting a bit. 

i dont remember the rest of the ride but i remember lying down at your house, exhausted from all the mistakes that we had made that week, and in the quiet you gently put your hand on my back, and that was the second that everything changed. the room was so still. it was so early. 

i know i didnt really handle our situation well. i had not yet learned the importance of grace. and i was so angry with you. and so confused and so guilty that i could not give you anything that you wanted. to this day i still feel awful for disappearing on you like that. i didnt know what to do.

i guess im not sure what im really trying to say here, i guess i just wanted to hear your voice, i guess hearing it really brings me back, but to what? i’m not sure. i want to say that my failures in my own relationships have made me understand better how you must have felt all that time, but then again i dont think ill ever really understand what i put you through. anyways, after all these years, i know that you will still pick up the phone whenever i call, and thats more than i can say for other people. 

i guess the thought of you still comforts me sometimes. your presence in my life is proof to me that people can find each other later, if theyre supposed to. if you wait long enough, the people that are supposed to be there always are. 

and i like that shirt. its a good color on you. 

i wasnt anticipating the nerves that i felt on the way. i thought to myself that there was no way that i was ready for this. no way i was over it yet. that it was too soon to be feeling like this. was this another one of those things that made me a bad person? well just because i dont think im a good person doesnt mean i think im a bad one. i think im both, really. and there i was just going back and forth back and forth wondering whether i should care, trying not to, questioning myself when i didnt. my head going in all sorts of directions when all i wanted was to stay still for a second. and then all of a sudden i was there, i was opening the door, i was sitting down. and then all of a sudden he was there, opening the door, sitting down. and then i must have hit my head or something because i dont remember anything besides the change of tune. i didnt notice anything but the thunderstorm in my mind trickling down to a few free raindrops. and then all of a sudden, hours later, it was over it was over and i was driving away again thinking

thinking that wasnt so bad at all.
thinking this is going to be great. 
thinking its nice to feel shy sometimes. 

and not thinking too much else.

i cant wait for the future, when i can look back on these months and somehow make sense of what was happening.

because i’m too in the present right now to really understand it.

i dont know yet the significance of whats been happening to me. i dont know if im getting too far in my own head. 

how can i feel both happy and sad at the same time? it makes the space under my ribs feel hot.  

this just doesnt make any sense yet.  

Dont ever tell anyone everything.

i know you dont know me but you look so familiar. you look just like someone else i used to know. maybe we were meant to meet each other too. probably not, but we can believe it if we want to. we can believe anything we want.

do you have a favorite color? what do you want to be when you grow up? whats the saddest thing youve felt recently? do you want to share some secrets? would you like to hear a joke? 

people dont compliment each other enough. i wanted to tell you that you looked beautiful the last time i saw you but i forgot because i was too sad. im going to say something nice to the next person i talk to. it really makes people feel a little better and its so easy to do. people dont compliment each other enough. 

well the last time i really wanted to know somebody i forgot to slow it down. sped it up instead. we talked about the future like we knew something about it and now the thought of him makes me cringe, so i just dont think about him. i think about other people instead but really everyone is broken. 

he doesnt think about me either. 

so dont go anywhere for a while, or go, whatever you want. but if you stay ill tell you a story, and you can decide for yourself whether its true, and you can tell me one, and ill believe everything you say, because im just in that kinda mood.

because ive been dreaming about the pacific ocean again. and ceramic bathroom tiles. and the reflection of the stars in the stillness of a river at 3 in the morning. 

theyre all the same color of blue.