Unloved at First Sight

I remember the precise moment I stopped loving him.
We had gone out to dinner.
I was just getting back from the lady's room.
He looked up at me and smiled.
His eyes, I noticed, were dead and lifeless.
Not even a dull glimmer of light remained. 
I blinked
thinking eyes would appear in the two gaping holes in his face.
They only grew deeper.
He looked at me quizzically.
Perhaps something in my expression had given me away.
I sat down beside him
avoiding looking at what had once been a pair of chlorine blue eyes.
It was as if something had changed in the time it took me to use the restroom. 
When I left everything was normal.
But when I came back he was no longer the man I loved. 
I denied it for a while,
dismissing it as a feeling that would pass just like indigestion. 
But it never did.
It only worsened.
An unexplainable bitterness began to build up inside me.
Today I looked through some old photos of us
and realized that I'd imagined those chlorine blue eyes of his
because he'd never had eyes of his own to begin with.
Funny howI was the one with the eyes and I was blind the whole time.
Maybe I should pluck my eyes out.

An Alcoholic's Affair

His touch was too eager.
Almost as if he was afraid
She would evaporate into thin air.
She wanted to.
But she laid there instead
as he murmured drunken slurs into her ear.
She could taste the bitter fluid on his tongue.
He never seemed to want her when he was sober anymore.
It made her feel utterly repulsive.
Was it her unsatisfactory performance
that had driven him to his alcoholism?
Or had her looks deteriorated so rapidly
that the thought of touching her was sickening?
Perhaps this is why his movements were always so rushed now.
He wanted to get it over with.
Maybe he no longer enjoyed it
but saw it as a right of passage he had worked so hard to earn
he felt obliged to indulge. 
Frankly, she no longer cared
to know the answer to these questions.
She felt his body convulsing on top of her -
a sign that he was close.
So she closed her eyes
and clenched her jaw.
"It'll be over soon" she thought.

Muse

October 3, 2012 10:49pm

                                                                              

It’s a sensual process.

Watching him paint.

But today I’m his subject, and there’s no talking. He likes it completely silent when he works. He talks about his paints like they’re a person, his brushes – a fine wine, and his canvas – a beautiful lady. He’s the kind of person that has a mind so complex that after a five minute conversation with him you’d just assume he’s dumb, or extremely high.

He says he can taste color. Sometimes I think I’m dating an eight year old. Then my eyes roll over his body, and I remember why I put up with it. When my eyes get to his waist he makes a hand gesture, signaling me to look at him. He wanted this painting to be profile. He’s very persistent about keeping eye contact. He says that the muse is as much the artist as the painter. They’re both part of the process. I open my mouth to say something, but he puts a finger to his lips and shakes his head. I scowl at him from behind wisps of my unruly curls. He smiles. He loves when I pout.

I’m wearing nothing but an oversized, tacky Bill Cosby sweater and a pair of his grey boxer-briefs. I’m sticky. I can feel the sweat dripping down my back. He’s been at it for an hour now. I’m uncomfortable, cranky, and tired. He says It’s sexy. He says I look better when I’m all grungy.

The cat curls up in my lap. He looks up from his canvas and frowns. He walks over to where I am on the couch and shoos the cat away. He walks back over to his canvas. It’s so large, he can nearly hide behind it. That’s saying quite a bit considering his large frame that stands as a whopping six feet and two inches.

Sometimes I think he enjoys painting more than he enjoys physical intimacy with me. When I see the way he looks at them – the paint, the brushes, the canvas – the way he speaks to them – the way he touches them. I envy them. What I wouldn’t give for him to caress me so gently. To whisper so sweetly. To love me so tenderly. My heart aches.

His fingers are on the canvas. He’s smearing the paint. He pushes his hair back from his brow and gets some blue across his forehead. There’s yellow on the bridge of his nose, and green on his left cheek. If I could taste color, I’m sure he’d taste divine.

He finally drops his brush against the easel, steps away, and smiles – admiring his work.  I stand and he waves me over. I look at it. It’s beautiful. Gorgeous even. But it’s not me. The girl in the picture is radiant. She’s flawless. She’s happy. She’s what he wished he saw when he looked at me.

We’re all just somebody’s muse I guess.

I wish I were the one behind the canvas, instead of the one on it. 

The Aimless Mind of a Brooding 19 Year Old

She spent her whole life dreaming. Everything and everyone she encountered told her
to stop. “It’s a waste of time” “It’s not healthy” “Grow up” they’d say. And eventually she
started to believe the things people said. She wanted big things - for herself and for
others, but it didn’t take long for her to realize the importance of settling. It made things
easier and she had the tendency to complicate them without even trying. She felt
isolated from the world just outside her door but she didn’t know how to change that or if
she even wanted to. The best things in life tend to waste away after a matter of
moments. They pass away as if they’d never existed. Maybe she’d imagined them all.
She began to condition herself to expect disappointment. It worked for a little while, but
hard as she tried to shield herself from the pains of everyday life - the bullet always
seem to find her. It always came, without fail and pierced her heart with little regard for
the repercussions. She longed for the day she would be good enough for the people
she loved. Maybe you had to earn it, and she hadn’t yet collected enough gold stars to
pick out of the treasure box.

Life. Of. Ventures. Everlasting.

It’s the way colors would taste if you could eat them. White would taste of contentment, yellow of happiness, purple of infatuation, red of passion, and pink would taste of endearment. Pick your poison; they’ll all be the death of you in the end.

                It’s the way it smells when it first begins to rain. Its aroma lingers like vanilla, fresh linen, or an open flame that’s sparks kiss your fingertips. It clings to your clothes and in your hair to be smelled by others around you. To some, this scent may be too strong.

                It sounds like complete silence amidst a roaring thunder. It’s at a frequency only you can hear and comprehend. It’s a ringing in your ears that leaves them throbbing or the echo of voices when you’re submerged in water --- starting loud and progressively fading away with the sunlight that rests on the water’s horizon.

                It’s the way butterfly kisses feel, faintly tickling your cheeks when they’re damp with fresh tears. Or the way your body shudders at the touch of a cold hand and your temperature elevates, leaving a numbness where fingers traced over your skin.

                It’s the way a sea of grass looks when you’re crawling on your hands and knees. It’s the sight of two hands clasped with fingers intertwined. It’s what causes your eyes to widen when you see the expression that lingers on her face when she thinks you’re not looking. The look that says all that can’t be spoken with words.

                It’s all the power that lies within that four letter, one syllable word. The word that redefines every one of your five senses. ..

                Love.

                Love may be like a lot of things, but it’s not like falling. I never fully understood the expression “falling in love” --- probably because it isn’t accurate, and doesn’t make sense. Falling is what people do on a daily basis --- love is when someone catches you. 

The Camera

10:38PM 8/18/12 – free write

                He was wearing that boyish smile I loved so much. It made my fingertips tingle with electricity. He knew exactly what he was doing. He was aware of his effect on me. It was a game to him…not that I minded playing along.

                His eyes search mine and his lips purse together. He’s thinking. I try to formulate my own version of his thought process. I draw a blank. I nuzzle against his stubbly face.

 “What is it?” I whisper.

“There’s something about you that’s both new and familiar. I can’t place it, but I know it’s there.”

I don’t want to talk. So I kiss him instead. He accepts it without complaint, his hand coming to rest at my collar bone. He has an unnatural obsession with collar bone. I roll over and grab His camera off the nightstand. He chuckles.

“It’s too late, I’m tired. I can’t.”

“Then, don’t. Let me,” I insist.

He doesn’t respond. I take that as an ‘okay’ and climb on top of him, straddling his waist to get a good angle from above. He moves his hands to my bare tights.

“Your hands are usually cold, but they’re always warm when it matters,” I say, squinting behind the lens.

“Well that’s good to know,” he responds, flipping on the lamp.

“The lighting is perfect.”

“What do you want me to do?”

“Nothing. I like it like this – it’s natural ya know?”

“Natural. Okay. I think I got it.”

I ruffle his hair a bit and turn his head to the side. He looks at me sideways and I can’t help but to smile. His eyes are grey today. His lips are a rosy pink from all the friction caused by our kissing. He licks them absentmindedly when he notices me staring at them. Snap, zhooo. Snap snap zhoo. I adjust as he pushes himself up onto his elbows. I snap a picture of his chest, one of his stubble covered chin, one of his lips, one of his eyes. There was still a slight layer of sweat that made him glow in the soft yellow light. I push him back down onto the pillow.

“Close your eyes.”

“Like this?” he says closing one eye, and peeking out of the other.

“Close them both please.”

“Yes ma’am.”

I look at him there in the stillness. He looks so peaceful. My body warms and I find myself lying against the crook of his arm. His eyes open and I close mine. He’s humming. I’m purring. I feel his hand rubbing the top of my hair and nuzzle closer.

“Look at me,” he says.

I open my eyes. “What?”

“What, what?”

“Why are you looking at me like that?”

“Like what?”

“The look. You have that look. The one that the guy gets in every romantic comedy when he realizes he’s falling for the girl.”

He closes his eyes again. I seize the opportunity. Snap, zhooo. He rolls over, pulling away from me. I snap a picture of his back.

“Enough with the camera Steph.”

                I place it back on the nightstand and crawl over to him. I use my lips to greet him. His shoulder blades, the back of his neck…his spine. I taste his goose bumps. He rolls back over and opens his arms. I fit perfectly. His face is pressed against my collar.

                “You smell like peppermint,” he sighs.

                “I love you too.”

                He looks me dead in the face, trying to find the right words for the thought that’s being processed in his mind. His mouth opens as if to speak, then closes.

                “You wear it well,” I say, interrupting.

                “What?”

                “The look. It looks good on you.”