Add you to a list of people who “love” me. Who reach out when they feel shitty about themselves, only to pull me down with them.

My number is saved in your phone for the times when you are weak, when you need my forgiveness to justify your choices.

Add you to a list of people who “miss me”. Who are getting better, who are thriving, who are lonely as fuck.

I am sick and I am tired.

I am not a phone number or an old friend. I am the one you called a whore, the terrible person you don’t recognize. I am worth the amount of energy it takes to ghost your best friend for months. I am worth nothing but a few nice words to put your mind at ease.

And when you realize that there aren’t people like me, wandering this world trying to give a shit for a change. When you realize that love is not a one-way street, the kind of thing you can take take take with nothing to give. When you realize that I deserve more than you could ever give me, do me a favor and delete my number from your phone.

And please, do not pretend that “love” has anything to do with it.

I want a sliver of my life to feel normal again. I want iced coffee on a day that is much too cold. I want to drive like we used to, to go somewhere and not feel exposed. Or like we are doing the exposing? I want to not feel so alone, so limited, so unsure.

I want Sunday, Sunday, Sunday.

I miss a lot of things, a lot of people too. I miss sunshine and coffee shops and toddlers smiling at me while their mothers wipe food from their faces. I miss parks and bars that only play sports on TV. I miss bumping into people at our favorite restaurants.

But I miss Sunday, Sunday, Sunday’s the most.

I will tell you I love you in all the ways that I can still say it without words. I will drape myself in pinks and reds and blues, in an attempt to be as bright as you. I will trace lines of words we used to sing together, tattooed on my body until the end of time. And sometimes I can still feel how small your hand was in mine, but we both know how much bigger your heart was. I can only say I love you in so many ways without words, but all the ways feel infinite. Like summertime and driving in the dark. Like roads that pulled us through them, hands clasped tightly to remind us that we had something to stay for and go home to. And I will miss you most in the summer, painstakingly and agonizingly so. But right now I miss you just the right amount, like a dull pain that never goes away. And I love you with words, but the ways seem bigger.

ours was the kind of love you write in Sharpie on concrete walls.

it was standing in the rain, huddled under your sweatshirt while we listened to songs that made us want to hold hands.

our love was records playing on Saturday morning and eating dinner on the couch.

it was coming home to flowers and love notes tucked neatly on the bed.

to love you was to love my best friend,

to love you was something I thought would last a lifetime.

you were the most fun I’ve ever had.

having a sick brain feels like cold creeping up on you,

through your clothes and to your bones.

feels like fire in your chest.

feels like, "i hate you".

feels like drowning.

feels like trying to scream, but choking on silence.

feels like, "you hate me".

feels like loneliness,

is isolation, is emptiness, is depression.

welcome to my sick brain, I can never quite keep it warm enough here.

I once loved a boy with brown hair and brown eyes, the kind of eyes that could burn a hole through you. I loved him unwaveringly, despite the fingertip bruises he left on my ribs. I loved him despite the heat he radiated in the summer, burning me up until my skin felt red and blistered by the sun. I loved him because and despite, because and despite. It was the kind of love that’s self-destructive, like he was. The kind that manifests into that sinking feeling you get when you watch him get high. The kind that you choose despite the knowledge that he can never offer you anything at all. Simply put, the kind you choose because you fucking hate yourself. I once loved a boy with brown hair and brown eyes; I still see him sometimes in people I meet.

being weightless, doesn’t sound so bad.

being empty, light as a cloud, is every girl’s dream.

eyes closed.

above the trees.

let the depression finally make me full,

isolate me.

being alone doesn’t sound so bad.

being empty is what I’ve always wanted.

above the trees, we feel nothing here.

spill your guts, tell me your secrets. tell me who hurt you, even if it only makes me feel better. tell me so I can understand. I will pretend to understand. spill your guts, while the wound is fresh, he cut you open and I want to watch you bleed. tell me your secrets, before I go. spill your guts for me.

I am way past angry.

I am way past hungry for revenge.

I am way past grieving the loss of my innocence, my childlike wonder.

I am nothing but nothing now.

I am way past screaming at myself in the mirror.

I am way past denial.

I am way past blaming myself for the things I could never control in the first place.

I am nothing but nothing now.

I am nothing but empty.

I am an island of me, surrounded by the emptiness you filled me to the brim with the second you made decisions about my body without my consent.

I am nothing but nothing now, but at least you don’t feel like everything.