furniture.

your father sent for the bookcase today. i guess that’s the end, then, isn’t it? this is all still hard to believe as i look around our scattered things, our lives intertwined in my old shirts and your high heels. 

i miss you. every day.  

i miss you every day.

remember when we went down to the river and skipped rocks? my hands were blistered and i was so frustrated that i couldn’t get the pebbles to 

hop… 

hop… 

hop the way you could. but i basked in your light, got high off of just being close to you, breathing you deep into me.

that night we loved each other passionately and desperately. we drank grapefruit juice when we ran out of alcohol, but it was on you that i was drunk. your skin, your hair, your eyelashes. all of your parts that combined to make this extraordinary being, this vessel that 

made 

Me. 

i listen to the same sad songs. 

i’m packing my things.

there’s a bra on the banister i can’t bear to move. this was you, dropping things just so, making a mosaic of our home.

i’m packing my things.

i’ll keep walking until my steps are no longer saturated with you.

i’ll walk a long

long

time.

“most. best. for real. forever. i love you.”

— -- steven adly giurgis' dedication to kadee strickland.

click clack.

click-clack.

click-clack.

i remember being little and listening to the sound of high-heeled shoes walking down the hallway, on the linoleum in the laundry room, climbing onto the escalator at the mall.

click-clack

click-clack

my own feet hit the pavement in new york city. they sit at the bar, they climb into a taxi, they faithfully take me home.

all of my shoes are lined up in a row— pair after pair of high heels, covered in soot from the city, saturated with my grown-up life. i’m watching them now, from my bed, hearing their familiar sound in my head,

click-clack

i made it this far

click-clack

i’m still here.

“oh,” he says softly, reaching up to touch her,
“i remember you.”

“oh,” his fingers are finding her face, her stony features drawing out the little heat that remains in his freezing fingers.

his breath pours out of him like a cloud of smoke, pools around her bosom and she is rising out of him, silent.

“i slept under you once,” he reminds her gently. he shifts his weight but his eyes don’t leave hers, even for a moment.

“i remember you.”

he is slow, careful. cold.

this place is buzzing and alive, warm with couples sharing kisses and umbrellas, blowing out cigarette smoke and whispering, “i love you, i love you.”

“you protected me,” he says
(i love you, i love you.)

“oh,” he says
(i love you, i love you)

and he drops his things, bags and bags of treasures: empty chinese food containers, paper cranes, and lays at her feet,

the place where her feet should be, the place where leaves and bits of chewing gum will call home until summertime, until someone comes and cleans her up and this place will be filled with water, with pennies carrying precious wishes.

“oh,” he says,
(i love you, i love you)

“i remember you.”
(she is rising out of him, silent)

i slept under you once.
(i love you, i love you)
 
you protected me.