Nevermind

You have cured me of my wanting.

Teenage Graces

There were two things I liked when I was 15; the boy next door and cigarettes. We would wander down the sun-dabbled back road under a canopy of birch trees inhaling forbidden acrid smoke into our lungs and stealing shy glances. I knew my mother would ream me out if she caught me smoking but the illicitness of the activity was half of the fun. The thrill of a secreted pack of cigarettes in my jean jacket pocket as I came home from school only added to my teenage illusion of rebellion.

The Indian summer wind would rustle the tree leaves sending the shadows dancing over our skin. We were too shy to hold hands but shared a cigarette back and forth akin in our social transgression. The sun would make his black hair shine glossy as it draped over his face hiding his dark eyes.

Some days when school let out, after the dusty bus ride down the long country road, we would sneak behind the shed with a lighter and the menthol cigarettes I spirited from my grandmother's purse as she busied herself in the other room. The thick, sticky sweet smoke would linger in my throat as I tried not to cough to maintain my air of rebel girl coolness. "I am a cool girl." I thought to myself. "I read heavy metal magazines. I smoke cigarettes. I want a tattoo. I dyed my hair black." But I knew it was hard to be a teenage rebel when you lived in a farm town of 700 people and the craziest thing you could do was drink yourself stupid on a weekend in front of a bonfire as the local boys started fights with each other.

I wanted a switch blade. I wanted a leather jacket. I wanted to stand on the corner in LA and score heroin. I wanted to be a character out of a movie or one of the books I read. I wanted to be a greaser. I wanted to be a rock star. I wanted to be dark hero. But what I really wanted was to have my 15 year old crush realize just how cool I was and lean over to kiss me behind the shed.

I wanted him to hold my hand down the school hallway. I wanted that stupid teenage grin the popular girl and her jock boyfriend always had when they made-out by the lockers. Instead I was the strange girl. The smart girl. The girl from a poor family. The girl who wore thrift store fashions and whose dad would pick her up in a beat up old truck. And behind that shed we never kissed. Only shared one cigarette planning our escape from this place if only we could just grow up a little faster and be just a little bit cooler.

The New Culture

They carry on with some form of homoerotic groping on the dance floor, sliding against each other. All lips and tongues and gliding fingers. I sit in the corner snapping my gum. I wonder how hard it would be to slip myself in the middle of that. I wonder how far hands can multiply with the right kind of encouragement. I wonder what the fuck I'm doing here.

I make a decision and I get myself positioned just right, in the middle of this mingling mass of sweating flesh and darting eyes. I watch the crowd ebb and flow like a tide to the DJ's auditory masturbation. The crowd is working itself up; working itself down to the floor. Gyrating hips grind against me. Someone presses against my side and glides away. I let the flow take me over swaying to the thump. The beat. The vibrations welling up from the floor. I just want to be in the middle. I just want bodies welling up against me. I need some skin under my fingers, some hips under my hands and some lips on my neck. I need to be somewhere else.

He comes up behind me slipping his arms around my waist. He moves against me. Presses on with the bodies around us. Sways with me. Watches my hands flutter up and reach behind me. Kisses my palms as I slid my fingers over his cheeks and into his hair. I turn to him. Wrap my arms around my neck and reach my lips up to his ear. "You're an asshole. But you make me feel wanted." He slides his hands up my short skirt, clenching my ass cheeks, pulling me tightly to his chest.

He leans over me. Presses his mouth against my ear and breaths "That's all I ever wanted, little girl. Shut the fuck up and lets dance."

Night Falls on the Beast

"Why don't you just tell me what you're thinking?" he says in an exasperated huff.

"What? Do you want to hear that I often picture you naked? That I touch myself with a vision of you tied to my bed firmly planted in my mind? That sometimes I picture you dead? Sometimes I wonder what it would be like to rip your heart out and eat it? That I want to fuck you so bad that if physically hurts me to be near you? Yeah... you might not want to hear what I'm thinking."

I keep my eyes on the dark road ahead of us and push the accelerator closer to the floor of my great land beast. The car's engine purrs in recognition. I drag on my cigarette blowing the smoke into a cloud from my lips.

"Do you want me to be afraid of you?" he asks turning to the window.
"I want you to fear me, yes. But I want you to love me more."
"Why do you have to be like this?"
"I don't know. This is just how I am."

The beast slides into the corners with the smoothness of ripples on water. The wind cascades through the windows and throws his long hair into his eyes. He whips his head but the strands stay in place. I take one hand off the wheel and reach over to brush the hair from his face grazing his cheek with my fingertips. I linger for a moment savoring the warmth of his skin traveling up my arm. He takes my hand to his lips kissing it gently. I take my hand back quickly to return to clutching the wheel. I strain my hands against the leather focusing my eyes onto the yellow line speeding past the hood.

"If you choose this path with me there will be no stopping. No turning back." I say flicking the cigarette out the window. A quick shower of sparks flares behind us on the pavement and fades. "I'll show you where the darkness leads. There's something inside me. It's hard to explain."

"I think I want to love you. I want to tell you the things you don't want to hear." he whispers in my ear slipping his hand onto my leg. He glides it up my stomach, over my breasts to rest his palm against my heart. I take my eyes off the road for a split second to see the tears welling up in his.

"This isn't going to end well." I say clenching his hand tightly. I lean, I kiss him and push the car faster then it has ever gone into that dark distant horizon. I let the world burn behind us and watch the night fall on the beast.

Whisper Loudly

Why do you never hear me when I call your name?

The Corruption of Inspiration

It is so very easy to start but o' so hard to finish.

I Knew Right Then You Would Break My Dirty Heart

It's my blood and I will do with it as I wish. I will keep it all trapped and sloshing in bottles on the shelf if I want to. I'll drip it down your throat while you sleep tonight. I'll infect you with myself. I'll be under your skin, digging in, digging down. I'll make you hate me and forget me at the same time. I'll refuse to exist.

And suddenly, the Fall is calling my name. She says the Summer was all a dream my fevered mind was never willing to accept. "Did you ever really think he was falling in love with you? Did you ever really think that warm skin could touch your coldness, your ice exterior and not be repelled? What were you thinking girl? Were you thinking you could be happy... here... for just a moment? Stop deceiving yourself and come home." She touches the leaves of my tomato plants and they shrivel brown shivering in the damp air. The stalks wilt and the fruit rots. She turns her grey eyes to me and kisses my cheek. She rains down on me running her wet fingers through my hair. Come home, she says, come home.

And the blood is running down my thighs past my knees and pooling at my ankles. It's filling up my mouth and when I part my lips I can only speak in burbles and spit the ground all red. The dirt drinks me deep filling up the cracks in the landscape. The Fall calls me Rain taking my hand to lead me to soft Winter who has been waiting for me all year. Winter takes my precious bottles of blood and kisses them until ice crystals dance like tiny ballerinas against the glass. The Winter calls me Snow and I jump sending tiny droplets into air. He catches my hair in his fingers and smiles. He leaves trails of ice down my cheeks with his trembling hands kissing me until I can see my warm breath vaporizing to mingle with the mist. Come home, he says, come home now.

And you might wake up tomorrow with the strange taste of blood in your throat and wonder where the summer went. You might wonder about the cold place next to you and the strange perfume upon your pillows. You might bury your head in your arms and remember unusually cool skin on a hot summer night curled against you whispering something that sounded like a dirty confession of love. You might think you remember me but I've gone home with my dirty heart to the clean white snows of Winter's hands and the gentle caresses of Fall's windy tongue to calm myself of your summery lies, heated hands and golden skin.

I've gone home to my kingdom of ice and you can forget me now with this season that will always keep us apart.

DreamEyes

In my dreams, I am not human.