of all the things i can blame

by sherry

i’ll say time. i’ll say bad timing.

——————–

“

Say sorry and go it alone. Write words like these only better. Listen to old songs. Wish they would’ve slept with your best friend or, or something, something which allowed you to hate them. They never gave you a reason to hate them. Would that all your future relationships could end in hate. Blinding, final hate — fiery like Cortez and his ships. Permanent. Something so explosive it propels you forward. Means it’s too painful to look back. Means you never relive the first date stop the vacations together come on the way they’d wake up ten minutes before your alarm to kiss you to consciousness just stop.

Say acceptance. This is the prize you earned for your maturity, for letting the logic of opportunity win out over emotion:

A relationship without the protracted descent into resentment. A friend. Sweet memories. Freedom in your twenty-somethings. Self-aggrandizing what-ifs. New lips, with their own stain. Awkward hugs. Facebooks you don’t check. A job. A school. A relocation. All your old tricks made new. Tension again — tension over comfort — you never knew how much you’d been missing it. Forever middle couch cushions. Bridging the distance. Walking the streets. Collapsing in bed. Hoarding the sheets. This was what you chose, remember? This was what you chose.

Say opportunity.

“