To Build a Home

There was once a boy with chocolate brown hair with a matching set of eyes, who taught me that kisses in the middle of dead ends were as disposable as the words that flew out of his mouth.

And he held onto me as tightly as you’d hold onto a rose stem littered with thorns as thick and abundant as the tears that went from my soul onto the page, where the ink became so smudged I hardly can read what a naive fifteen year old I no longer know had to say about it.

He was a home, my first home, a dark home.

One that was filled with

broken promises

slow dancing

(his never ending sock collection made him slip, a lot)

and his grandmas god damn cookies

I never got to god damn taste,

because by time the dough was kneaded

enough time passed where I was just the

girl from poetry class

(did he ever read the poem I wrote for him?)

who would’ve done anything to see him

make a home out of me, too.

And then the boy with thick, dark skin and a pair of glasses that would get stuck in my hair when they’d fall off while he laid in between my hips. A year and a half after the last, he seemed like the perfect investment. Sturdy, reliable, strong. Filled with promises as pure as the Holy Water his hateful mother hypocritically prayed for God to love me because she had no room in her heart to.

Too bad he made a home out of me before

I could fully move into him.

For his hands were the first to know parts of my body

I did not know myself.

And eventually time passed where

my windows rusted

and vines grew from my body

binding me to a person

I did not love.

And though my heart did not beat in synchrony with his,

it still broke when he got me suspended

for forcing me to fool around

in places where fools don’t exist,

just because he’d break up with me

if I refused.

(I’m sorry, I have no specifics in parenthesis. It’s hard to remember someone you do not have a reason to.)

And never did I figure that the next home I’d live in would be for two years. A boy with bright blue eyes, and a Mustang to match. A boy whose words melted me in ways his Aunts famous cookies did, and whose kitchen held a picture of him and my brother at age 7, holding soccer balls. He’d kiss me for the first time after four months of dating rumors, and a fragility more terminal than Leonards short term memory loss in Memento, one of his favorite movies. But fragility is beautiful too, just like him.

And we were built to fall apart

because of a friends who couldn't

keep their mouths shut

and a sexual pull that exists to this day,

but fall back together

about a half hour after New Years hit,

(we were always a damn step behind)

which spiraled into eight months of

drunk calls from

334 miles away.

(“come here,” “I love you,” “you’re my good thing.”)

and award winning movies

we never watched

because his hand was around my throat,

while he kissed every part of my body

I had always hated.

Then the toxic movie we pretended we were in

came to an end

as they always do.

I’ve never wanted someone to comfort me

while they were the reason I needed comforting

in the first place.

And I still tend to forget about him for so long

that sometimes I forget why I needed to.

He’s earned a lot of pages in my poetry book

for being the boy who tried to love

(And being the first boy I have ever loved.)

The souvenir I got him from Italy is still on his desk,

and I’ll probably see him on Tuesday for lunch.

I stick with boys who remind me of apartments now, with leases that expire as fast as it takes for a romantic thought to even pop into my head. I stay for a couple moments, before disappearing into the next one. And every time I pass them, I remember those moments.

Like the boy who called me wild for biting his lip

in the middle of a crowded room,

who calls me a bitch now.

And the boy who was older,

who is the reason I don’t trust going into boys rooms alone,

who I thank for the counseling sessions.

And the boy with grey eyes who I “read like a god damn book,”

who has a long list of exes,

and who deserves to be more than a one-night stay.

But I’m sorry I can’t invest enough

To see if anyone would love me past Escrow.