921 days without you

There is no way I can open up a can of black olives without thinking of you. What are the olives trying to say? They do not speak but they remember for me, because much of what happened back then is fuzzy, but not the day we decided together by pooling our pennies, we had double the buying power. Why was it that both of us deeply craved black olives at the exact same time? Could it be we could read each other’s minds? I’ve often wondered why we didn’t choose to buy a black and white cookie or Carvel flying saucers instead. Did we crave salt because of all the tears? I know you cried too because I felt your pillow in the morning. Why did you hide your tears from me? I could have held you like you always held me. Remember when we decided we couldn’t take it anymore and we would run away? But how could we? Where we would go? You made it all possible, planning every detail, always taking charge. “Go to the window at midnight. I will be waiting for you below. Trust me. When I say jump. Jump. I will catch you.” And I listened. Believed you. And you caught me without blinking, stoically, as if all along it was your arms I belonged in. Could it be we were two bodies, two beating hearts as close as the moon and earth during a total lunar eclipse? Born second, 921 days after you, what did you do for all those moons without me? Were you lonely? Waiting? Did you wonder what I would look like when our mother held you lovelessly on her lap with me right behind you in her womb? Could I have known the one that carried me would not be the one who carried me through, caught me? It was you all along, the one I sang Edelweiss with in the subway station, under the earth, too young to be off on our own. Fledglings. She would send us away again and again to be rid of us and we went, wandering aimlessly, wondering when the nightmare would end. It didn’t. We both know we are still haunted, but can we stop for just a minute and think about what it would have been like if we didn’t have each other? I cannot. Will not. And if the time comes that you need to be carried, please know I will be here to catch you. Let me. You have carried me for far too long.