my first relationship made a fool out of me. then it ended. of course it did. i’m always the butt of the joke, i’m always so easy to step over. i don’t blame anyone for leaving me here on the ground.

i think i knew it wouldn’t last, but i’m surprised it feels like this. like silence. like square one, like i’ve been pulled back instead of pushed forward. i always forget that i’m chained down to this version of me i’ll never escape. cowardly, unfulfilled, all alone. fooled myself into thinking it would be different this time, that i’d become something, keep something, mean something to someone forever and ever. nothing’s forever but the pursuit of meaning. reaching, reaching, reaching,

i’ll never know what it’s like. the chain has an end. it clinks, tenses, yanks me back down every time i touch light.

it’s lonely down here. it’s where i belong. nothing can hurt me in the dark.

i haven’t done anything since i got back. dumped my damp, rain-soaked suitcase in front of the door on the only visible patch of ground left in my room and got in bed for two days. i left three times to change tampons. ate only brazilian chocolate and made a string of paper cranes from the wrappers. stared through the mirror past what might’ve been a pair of eyes, tore pictures and notes and receipts off the walls. taped the ring she gave me to the pile of stuff i never want to read again and stuffed it at the bottom of a folder on my bookshelf, right beside yours. a paper trail of failure. one day, i’ll need a bigger box for it all.