Encore

Wake up one morning, in the same bed, the same house, the same you. Yet everything is different.

You don't complain about the rain anymore. The weather's not too hot anymore. Work isn't taxing anymore. And the hours aren't too short anymore. No, you're not in love. But in the prospect of being.

What happens when you've known someone, not so intimately, but intimate by default. And one morning they're changing the way you look at Life, or determining how many fits of rage, how many bouts of tears, how many shocks of happiness you're entitled to in a day. Or two. Or more.

You might want to get out of the situation. You might want to stay. But it's not up to you anymore. And when it was, you didn't even know you were in the situation.

All I want to do is hold your hand, when no one's watching, snuggle up to you after a much too intoxicated night, watch every little movement of yours, while you stay focused on television, with your head lying on my thighs. Watch you whisper to me that I'm beautiful, at the break of dawn. Stay, just for a cup of coffee, breakfast, and you. Steal looks and smiles, and hushed conversations, on cold nights. Exchange lives, exchange breaths, exchange souls and still stay intact.

Has it really been six months? It feels like a lifetime. Much too long for you to have been an impervious backdrop to the scenes in my reel of life and not have said a word until now.

Then why is it that when you chose to speak, and step out of every little frame of anonymity, to finally make me see you, you also brought with yourself a window to my old life, the ghosts that refuse to stop haunting. I want you without the memory of my mistakes. I want you without you being hurt or scared, of being you again. I want you, fearless.

I want you, and I don't register the thoughts of others, because when I look at you, I hear laughter, and a friendship, that at least in my head, I forged when I was much younger.

If only I'd met you then. If only I'd stopped myself. But you're in ink now. And I'm too far along.

Encore.