Wednesday, February 16, 2011

MY NAME IS AVA

Gripping the warm mug was my only solace.  A long weekend with no plans of my own. My heart was pained and I had caused it -or at least allowed it-and now I sipped.  The only warmth in my chest came from hot cocoa doused with caramel –like the color of his skin.  I was alone and it hurt. It wasn’t good but it was best.  The best I had done wasn’t good enough at least in one person’s eyes.  Or were those eyes mine?  I still get confused because my emotions are in such disarray.  I guess they always had been but somehow unrecognized by me.  Did he know? And who cares? Why am I asking.  It wouldn’t change him or me.  And I should hope that it wouldn’t. As I said before, this is best I could do.  Another sip didn’t turn off the faucet of coldness I felt in my veins pumping ice to my heart. Voided with a step out of the door. Voided with his hand in hers. Canceled out with the passionate kiss they shared. Controlled by the absolute collapse of us.  Taken over by the absolute collapse of me. I took another sip and this time is fueled me as a hug from a friend would.  A knowing look in the eyes of someone that cared to simply be there.  A gentle nudge to jump boldly back into life. Or at least creep quietly into the next day.  It filled with the sun and emptied with the moon, my heart that is.  As night fell so did I.  Onto the floor with sobs like a toddler. Dying with each tear. Screaming with each shake of my shoulders. No one heard me but they saw.  The beauty in my eyes turned into gray circles beneath them.  The confident walk no more. A wilted neck with my head rising only to appear awake. The internal beat of my heart barely audible and I couldn’t feel it. Gripping my mug with all my strength, sobbing with any energy I had left, head hung to the lowest it’s ever been as I listened to the voice mail again and again. “Be ready for me Tiffany, we have 3 days for just you and me. I love you.”   

A BRISK WALK

I walked briskly down the Avenue.  I wanted to get there before she did. The wind was blowing ferociously and whipping my freshly curled locks all around.  I hated when that happened.  I needed my hair, and everything else, to look exactly the same way it had when I last looked into the mirror.  Frizzed curls and hair stuck to thickly applied lip gloss was not going to help me win.   I’d said it as if it were some sort of challenge, a game.  And he was the prize.   He was a beautiful, muscular, chivalrous, generous hard-bodied prize. I was overdue for the “number one” spot .  The last time I’d won anything I was 9-years old and spelled “meticulous” correctly.   Well, there was the $5 scratch off when I was 18.  But hell I’d spend it exactly where I’d won it at the liquor store.  On a pack of cigarettes, gum and 8 blow pops. Later my friends and I walked throughout the neighborhood lighting up and being “cool”.   My friends and I thought we were grown and tempted our legality often.  Being 18 was fun but now I was older.  Out of my teens a month ago, I was twenty now and much more mature.  I’d been through a few things.  I’d seen a lot more.  I knew that men couldn’t be trusted and women could be trusted even less.  I had a 20-hour a week job, was enrolled in college-12 credits!  I had a lot on my plate!  I truly didn’t have time to deal with this mess but I wasn’t about to let HER have anything that I wanted.  He wanted me too.  He’d spent every night with me last week didn’t he? Plus I knew him more than she did.  He was only using her because she was easy. You know, a loose girl.  Probably anyone who showed her enough attention could get her to do anything he wanted.  A shame.  She should be ashamed. Didn’t she have parents? WOW.  How embarrassing.   But she didn’t seem to care. I mean I respect myself way too much to behave the way she does.  That’s why I had to show up. And let her know she can’t and won’t have him.   She was silly to think he would choose her over me... 

Wednesday, February 2, 2011

ONE MORE TIME

If I could do it all over again I would love you after I loved me and then love you again.  I would love you hard and love you perfectly.  If I could start over I would know what I want from you and I would tell you to give it to me.  If I had another chance to love you, I would.  If the opportunity came along, I would praise God for our love.   And I would pray that we would always be.  I would already know that we were in God’s plan.  But because I can’t do it all over again, I’ll remember my love for you, love that I didn’t have for myself.  Because I am not able to start over, I can only love the memory of us, if only the good parts of us. Because I don’t have another chance to be with you, I will try to forget all the good parts of us that I just can’t forget.  Since another opportunity for us won’t come along, I will thank God that I had you for a season and praise Him that my heart still beats even when I didn’t follow HIS plan for us.  I will pray now that His plan for me isn’t to be alone because without you that’s all I am.