Untitled.

I'm lonely when you're around. My brain has mismatched emotions that I should be feeling. The wrong circuits are lighting up. Or maybe, I've just forgotten how to not feel alone.
I could blame you. You're frazzled, involuntary, quiet. You aren't the savior I expected you to be.
I lock myself in my car sometimes with a bottle of vodka. The musky smell of the dark garage doesn't seep into my skin like the spirit does. I could stay there for hours. I don't think. Because if I think, I might turn the keys in the ignition and drive away from the dark garage, the missing love letters and you.
When we lie together at night, the silence is shattering and yet somehow, it's fulfilling. My hair clings to my neck in the sticky heat of the dark and it comforts me. I'm still human. I take a draw from the lit cigarette and pass it to you without acknowledging your presence. You're always there, yet you never are.
It's moments like this when I contemplate suicide. It doesn't seem like such a difficult feat to wrap my lips around the barrel of a pistol and pull the trigger. It's moments like this when I realize I wouldn't miss you.

The Kitchen Fire.

The sizzle and popping of hot grease sounds from the kitchen as though the center of her world were on fire. And though her face and manner are both cool, inside, mountains are falling.
Her name had been replaced long ago; it was almost as if she didn't exist anymore. She's still as delicate and ghostly in figure as she had been 7 years ago, but her eyes had hardened. These 7 years had made her quiet, careful with the words she said.
But today was a different day. Today, she had decided not to speak at all.

The screen door slams and her heart skips a beat. Suddenly, she was in fear of soda cans and mismatched socks. Footsteps, the steel toe boot kind. Then, a chair screeches across the linoleum floor, but she doesn't turn to look. He's speaking, calling her by the name he'd replaced her identity with. She can't hear what he's saying for the pounding of her heart beneath her chest.
Needles thrust up into the pads of her feet and her stomach begins flopping sickly. She can't think for the burning in her forehead until she finally turns to fix her eyes on his back as he sits and eats.
Her legs move without her consent, gliding across the room. She feels the coolness of the utensil burning in her hand. Above his head, on the wall, is hung a plaque that reads "Jesus is the silent listener to every conversation." If only life could be that serene.
"Today is the day.", she says.
"What the hell you talkin' about, woman?".
Without thought or command, as though action is all that's demanded, she raises her right hand and thrusts the carving knife into the back of his neck, eight times.
His body seizes violently until it finally releases and his face falls into the plate of food before him, blood pooled all around it.
She hears the knife drop as it clatters onto her prided kitchen floor. Then, leans over and vomits where she scrubbed on her hands and knees just days before. She stands, walks to the sink and turns on the tap to wash her face and hands.
For the last time, she watches blood swirl with water as it dances down the drain. Except this time, it's not her blood.