The moment we finally saw each other, you wrote in your agenda that it was "the day life changed". I thought this was a little overstated, but it turns out, it's the best part of the story now. Everything else sounds better to remember slightly differently, and so...
I can see us there, lying on our backs beneath the prismatic glow of the beaming sun, our soft white underbellies exposed. Nothing tries to kill us, even though my wounds are raw and gaping. I tell you I feel like I might be bleeding out, but you say I've never looked more alive. Like I could be dancing in a meadow of wildflowers in some other life. If these are our last moments, let us savour them like rapacious children picking ripe berries off the vine, the juices of life dribbling crimson red down our sun-kissed chins. If for some reason one of us doesn't make it, I know for sure I'll find my way to you in the next realm.
We talk about our families, how they fucked us up to the point we stopped subscribing. I tell you about the time my dad gave me a hundred dollar bill the night my brother died. And I talk about all the parties my parents threw -- the collection of sloppy, pathetic drunks who'd somehow hardened me; like uncle touchy, his hot breath reeking of Old Style Pilsner wrapped in dog-shit as he whispered cloying words to me until I screamed out from under the covers. Or the sad subservient housewives who set alight my feminist brain. Or the on-brand misogynists who forced me to sharpen my brazen tongue. I'll never let anyone put a hand over my mouth. I'll never let anyone buy me out.
You squeeze my hand and whisper, "your heart stayed pulpy, though." We both laugh because we know it's true. I'm undercooked and effusive. I cry over babies and seeing the innards of roadkill and unnecessary violence on TV.
We talk about how our younger selves saw the world through holy eyes. Back before the shattering of innocence. Back before the millennial inclination to walk slowly backwards in time just to unravel the trigger points. Back before the excavation of calcified skeletons unearthed behind locked closets, as if the grisly truth didn’t harden everything with time. Back when we thought anything mattered at all. Now we know better. You and say you can't remember who you are, only who'd you been taught to be. But you'll always be one of the good ones to me.
My breaths are becoming shallow, and I know that our time is short-lived now. I ask you to sing me something pretty. You pick Neil Young -- After the Gold Rush. I always told you I wanted to hear his songs as I faded out...
Well, I dreamed I saw the silver spaceships flying
In the yellow haze of the sun
There were children crying and colors flying
All around the chosen ones
All in a dream, all in a dream...
And as it stands, that's all it will ever be.