I don’t think you understand
I wasn’t supposed to fall in love with you
I wasn’t supposed to look into your eyes and want to drink them because they’d be stronger than any spirit you could ever give me
I wasn’t supposed to put my hand on your arm and wish it were your waist; your hip; your skin
Remember how I told you I was stupid?
This is what I meant
It is stupid to walk out of a burning building and jump head-first into a hurricane
It is stupid to love a hurricane just because it touches you and tosses you and takes you away from everything you’ve ever known
Just like it was stupid to start that fire and let it lick away at you and love it because of the pain
I write because it is all I know how to do
I cannot speak because the wires between my tongue and my heart are twisted, and all my words are shadows and echoes of somebody else’s
I cannot do because my hands are shaking and my legs are dead and I have always been useless anyway
I trust you
But I don’t, because there has never been a voice in my life that hasn’t lied to me, and there have never been arms that held me for anything but what I give back
This is what I am good for: giving
Not to be loved, or cared for, or listened to
I give and I love and I care and I listen until I am shredded inside and no one ever learns to gives a damn about me
I do not say this to be dramatic
I say this because it is true
And sometimes…it kills me
Yes, I love you, but I have to love me too, and every day I do not run from you makes another screw tighten in my chest because everything I know is telling me to run
Please don’t hurt me
I will love you – and indeed I do – with everything I am, but please don’t hurt me
Please don’t make me regret not running from you
Please don’t be another mistake
Please be the other kind of hurricane