so here it is. it's december and everything's frozen again. i oversleep and chase the sun as its already setting. i keep myself beating with coffee and cigarettes and they burn holes in my stomach and my lungs. i'm darker than i was before. you wouldn't want to know me anymore.

i figured out why my room always has so much dust in it. most household dust is dead skin cells anyways, even in places where people don't scrape the backs of their hands to a pulp. its my own self that settles on the cd shelf, the mirror, the table beside my bed. dead, shaved skin on my pillow, on my floor, on the clothes i wear. falling all around me. coating every surface. i whittle myself down and live in a room covered in my own remains.

what did i ever have to worry about back then? days only serve as reasons to destroy it all. each day i'm alive is another reason to be dead.

my room smells like old food and burning flesh. i cant step on the floor without cracking something or slipping on a dirty shirt. i'm better than this. am i? am i better than chasms in my forearm? better that garlic-covered napkins, empty bottles, paper scraps? better than unopened texts and an all-consuming obsession, a cyclic hatred aimed right for me? i don't think i am. i think i've reached the bottom and the only way to get out is to give up.

my skin burns with how much i want out. it burns, literally. dripping blood. i'm unrecognizable from the person i was supposed to be. i think i killed the better me.

i cover my wounds with paper towel and electrical tape, with hot wheels bandaids from the dollar store. i only run errands for gauze and vaseline.

some lady on the train said "have a good night" and i grunted in return. i used to like talking to people.