Grayspace

01/11

30 years ago. 30 years ago you were born. 13 years ago, my timeline overlapped yours for a few beautiful months. I learned three things. One, you were everything, two, I would never be enough. Not in this life or any other. Three, I would never be the same again, between what you gave and what you took. Maybe I mostly dreamed you up. Maybe you were my creation entirely. Real or imagined, when I have the clarity to address the issue of self, I find myself with white-knuckled fists full of rubble. And I wonder how I got here. how did I stop thinking to the point you could sneak a bomb into the innermost chambers unchecked. And the answer is always because you were you. You were this amazing spark, this light I had never seen before, and for a brief stretch, you were within reach. And somehow, in some way, which you still refuse to tell me, I dropped the ball. I didn't measure up. I dont know if I didn't listen enough or didn't act soon enough, but just as real as you were here, you were gone. saying "sorry" before I could say anything in reply. as if final is final final is final. There's lots of things I could call you and I might even be justified in it. Thing is, I understand too much about who you were and where you were coming from. I wouldnt have done any better if we switched places. And that was something you were starved for. Someone that understood. I'll never know if you ever quite grasped how much I "got it," when you just weren't able to verbalize what was happening in your head. You needed a safe place to land and I gave it to you. I'll never know if you realized that. Your birthday is gray and overcast and quiet. Don't know if you know this, but that's the precedent for every day ever after. I'll be here waiting and watching like I always have. A human monument. When I get you back, I'll get myself back. And the kicker is I know you're never coming back. you've made to your own way and your own life, somehow putting a blind spot in your vision that used to include me. like I'm so easily supplanted. I've tried the same. all the little tricks. like, having an imaginary funeral for you. but you're still here. You're too much of the alphabet that spells out the words, you're too much of the breaths that comprise the day's breathing, I mean that's what you've always been: too much. Too special. Too meaningful. Too memorable. Just too much. You can't just cut something like that out of the scope of memory. Well, I can't. Maybe that's a flaw on my end, maybe it isn't. I just know that I remember your voice like I heard it yesterday, and the affection in your short, eccentric voicemails gave me some cognizance of existing for an actual reason. And I keep telling myself, I keep pushing myself, I keep persuading myself, that if I wait out so many years of silence and gray miles, we'll meet again in the way we were supposed to. And I'll be what you needed. and you won't be so turned upside down to see it. And we will be Us again. And I can be me again.