I wasn’t born a monster.
Taking the first train out of town wasn’t the bravest thing I could have done, nor the most original, but courage and creativity do not run in my veins.
You once told me there were over 10,000 miles of railway in Texas. I wonder now if I laid out my insecurities and doubts and all of the lies I told you, if it would add up to a hundred miles or a million.
I could ask you, but it wouldn’t earn me an answer now.
There are a lot of things that I would ask you if it would make a difference.
You collected stones. Only the smoothest ones, tossed up by the sea on the west coast. Once a year, you would go to collect them. I was never invited.
On the day you died, those stones taunted me. There were thousands of them. They were piled up in heaps in dusty corners. I never understood why you kept them. If I had the chance, I would ask you now.
I remember the night you called me, yelling senseless things through the line until you got tired. Your breath hitched and caught, heavy in my ear. You hung up and we never spoke about it again.
Your face was so beautiful underwater. Your thick eyelashes. Your lips, pouting in a final objection. Your skin was as white as our sheets and as smooth as the words you spoke.
Some people talk in their sleep. I hope to God I never do.
(Source: critiquingthecritics)
