I thought about you again tonight.  You showed up like expected.  If only I could shut the door and tell you no, but we both know that could never happen.  How could I?  It’s cold outside and you don’t have a jacket.  So I invite you in to stay, but just to talk and just for a second, no more.  ”No, no more than that,” I tell myself.  

But it never is for just a second.  You wouldn’t have it that way.  No, instead you come in and give me a hug.   God it’s good to feel your arms around me.  For a split second it almost feels like it used to, like that time you held onto me and wouldn’t let go.  I had to peel you off of me, and then you cried and I cried before I left.

We talk and talk and talk.  You bring up that one time that we went to the river together, when we laid in the sun all day.  You told me to put sunscreen on, but I ignored you.  I got burned.  I say something funny and you laugh.  I’ve been waiting all night for that laugh, for that smile.  I would do anything, anything, anything to see that smile forever.

Sometimes I want to ask you what happened, why it all ended, how you could love me like you did yet still leave.  But I know that I wouldn’t get an answer.  You can’t give an honest one.  So we talk more about nothing, and we smile and pretend that it’s all okay and that we are happy, when we aren’t.  Then, after some time has passed, and you are satisfied that you have secured your place in my mind for another few weeks, you decide that it’s time to leave.  I open the door for you, like always.  We stand there in the cold, and you hug me again, but with less feeling.  Now I’m the one who doesn’t want to let go.  It’s funny how the tables turn sometimes.  So I hold you tight, until we finally part and you look at me longingly before walking away into the dark.  I’m standing by myself in the cold.  I can see my breath in front of me, curling off in wispy clouds before disappearing.

Written by my friend Kyler at http://lifeat24fps.tumblr.com/