#12 | ghosts
I'm playing video games at the desk we used to share. it becomes 10 pm and I realize you haven't come home to squeeze my shoulders and see how it's going, to tell me it's okay if I'm losing. I don't mute my voice call, take off my headphones to say hi to you, or ask how things went at the gym tonight. when I log off and slink into bed at 2 am, you're not there to grumble and turn in your sleep.
I wonder if you have the same urge, to reach for me. if you find yourself taking a long shower and suddenly wishing you could ask me to bring your toothbrush with a squeeze of toothpaste on it. if you have the compulsion to complain when I leave the bathroom, to request that I sit on the edge of the bathtub and talk stream of consciousness while you wash your hair, so I can make you laugh and keep the doom away a touch longer, until you're too sleepy for depression to find you.
I know this will all fade eventually. for posterity, I wish I could write down everything I ever learned about you, and also the ways we used to fit together. I guess I'll try writing just a couple things.
you loved ruffles so much that you could finish a family size bag in a day. it was the one snack you never tired of, as opposed to trader joe's sour gummies and chinese roasted peanuts. you'd try to stop yourself though. you'd put on a youtube video, eat two thirds of a bag, and then throw it on my lap, saying, get it away from me!, smiling and satisfied and mildly regretful. but I didn't want to. I liked seeing you eat a lot. my favorite photo of you will probably always be the one you hate the most - when you fell asleep on the couch while eating chips, crumbs dusted on your shirt.
you would always leave the room when you cry, as if nobody should ever see you like that. I saw your roommate today and asked her how you're holding up. she said you're very strong. everyone says that - that you're strong. you always appear fine so nobody has an opportunity to see the truth, and then the hurtful things slowly, slowly fade. I used to think I was weak by comparison, but I realized that my strength is just different. I need to feel things completely and openly to get over them. I need to collapse into the ground before I build myself up again, better. and I suppose that made it hard for us to see and support each other, at least at this age. maybe someday time will smooth that out, but we need to understand our separate selves first.
I can never stay angry because I know anger is just embarrassed sadness. even now, when I'm racked with anxiety about moving out, I was only angry for a day or two. you probably know I'm blaming myself all kinds of ways now. maybe you're blaming me too. maybe someday you won't anymore. maybe at that point I won't care. it's possible I'll never know, or I'll only realize when I admit it out loud to someone else.