His lips were blue and kissed with toxin from the Domoxin that reeked his breath; he was poisonous. Not prescribed for my atmosphere, my world shuttered from his presence.

He slipped into my veins at the age 8 and curled inside my walls. Inside the empty auditorium of my ribcage that echoed the sound of a heartbeat, he made it hard to speak, he made it hard to breath, he made it hard to do anything. He beckoned me back to the prison of my bed, whispering sweet lullabies of the dead.

We became roommates inside of myself because I could not afford the payments of my own body, but lately he’s been taking up too much room. He’s venturing from my chest to the trebling tips of my fingers, to the insides of my raw bleeding cheeks. These walls have worn thin; they are crumbling at its foundation and the holes in the walls are boarded up like a seam between vulnerability and strength. He picks the nails and boards like a scab that he refuses to let heal, because he enjoyed watching it bleed.