Flashback Friday- Ghosts

it's 1030
i've written something already today
checked in with social media "friends"
eaten a full meal AND prepped a snack
drank enough red wine that my lips and tongue are stained
i just finished unpacking my overnight bag though i've been home for 8 hours
i just finished unpacking my overnight bag 'cause a part of me wants to still be where I spent the night
but i'm not there
i'm here
i'm here in my square footage trying to ignore the ghosts that are suffocating me in the ether.
i should be asleep.
i didn't sleep much last night.

Or the night before. 

i should be asleep,
but i'm not.
i'm here and i can hear the ghosts of the arguments i've had with my past
the laments
the promises made
and broken.

The ghosts are deafeningly loud.
i haven't slept in my new bed in a week
my new bed
instead,
i've slept in the bed i shared with the man i shared a name with for more than a week 

To appease the ghosts.

I've offered my peace as a sacrificial lamb to the others who invisibly dwell in my apartment.

sleeping in the bed that i shared with the man i shared a name is probably why i feel the way i do
the mattress has been cleaned countless times soaked through with the tears i shed for the yesterdays that are no more....

i wish i could've played those scenarios out differently...

i wish i could've been strong enough to face those ghosts alone, but that night I wasn't.

That night, there was only one thing I needed.

I knew that calling him was a mistake, but out of all the mistakes I made in life, 

He was always my favorite. 

Still, I dialed.

Still, I invited.  

The call was a bad idea.  

One in a series of bad decisions that always ended with us being another incarnation of us.  

He was my worst decision and favorite mistake.  

I thought if we went somewhere public, perhaps I could keep it together.  

He offered to scoop me. 

I accepted. 

He parked instead of waiting for me to come downstairs and instead of waiting came upstairs.
It had been almost 6 months since I'd last seen him and I thought I was safe.  Anything you do for 2 weeks becomes a habit. How long did it take to break one?

The air was tense. 

It was thick with what we weren't saying.
I have always suffered from word vomit everywhere else in life except with him.
With him, I was a selective mute.
Deliberately not saying all that my heart desires for fear of rocking the boat. 

I'd bite my tongue until it bled instead of spewing the verses I'd instead type to/for/about him.

Happily letting the metallic taste of the blood trickle down my throat with the red wine is never tasted before him.

He always poured heavier than I did. 

Ever the gentleman, he never showed up empty handed...

His gifts and baubles were always bottles that I gulped as readily as I swallowed his kiss. 

He always knows what I like. 

Knew...

Tonight would be no different.

Clearly, there would be no public space for us tonight. 

Clearly, there would be no outside for us tonight.

As familiar with my houses as the ghosts I longed to banish,

He found glasses, 

and poured,

Heavy.

He poured, 

I sipped in between bites on my tongue to ingest the words I'd rather choke upon than say aloud 

first.

Countless incarnations and he always made me feel as young as when we first met.

When he first courted me. 

The wine never lasts as long as the buzz does especially when being embibed quickly. 

The space between us shrank fast until there was none.

He always held me so close.

He always held me so tight.

It got so that when I was around him, I only breathed what he exhaled.

The tension in the air escaped as I breathed from his lips. 

As I drank from his mouth,

I didn't need words anymore. 

I forgot all about my room with two beds.

I forgot all about the ghosts.

Absorbing his quiet made the room fall silent.