i wriTe bEcauSe i EXiST

it's all shit. but you can see that for yourself. --for the record, there's more to come, i just got lazy and decided i didn't feel like typing anymore for the time.

Vegas
They are running away to Vegas; she wants bright lights and anonymity and he won't let her move on alone. They fight over the radio from Miami to Atlanta and she slaps him once they reach Memphis. He talks philosophy through Little Rock, and by the time they reach city limits she pulls into a Kwik-E-Mart to purchase headphones and a walkman. At a restaurant in Oklahoma City he tells her she is heinous; while passing through Elk City she writes in her journal that he is a bastard. She is stung by a wasp at a rest stop outside Tulsa and winces as he plucks the stinger from her forearm and washes the area clean. She apologizes for slapping him in Memphis when they reach Amarillo and he finally kisses her in Albuquerque. She visits an old boyfriend in Flagstaff and he lets him catch up over lunch while he carefully studies a menu so he won't have to face the boy she once loved. He sulks halfway to Kingman until she tells him the guy is as much a prick now as he used to be; she laughs so hard at a hotel diner in Henderson that she spits soda out her nose. They stop at a roadside ice cream stand in Winchester and he gets sick in the breakdown lane; she rubs his back and kisses his neck while he pukes on her good shoes. By the time they reach Vegas they are fighting again; they are sweaty and frustrated and arguing over where to park. She gets drunk that night for the first time ever with an Elvis at a casino lit like diamonds while he stays awake in their hotel room listing prices from apartment guides and checking the time every ten minutes. When she staggers to bed as the sun is coming up he does not say a word, but instead faces away from her and sleeps. His snoring keeps her awake; she rises in late afternoon hung over and irritable and pissed that he left a trashcan and a bottle of Advil next to her before he left to go swimming in the hotel pool. She leaves again that evening to watch chorus girls and magic shows, but this time does not tell him where she is going. He sits in the casino downstairs gambling their first month's rent and deposit while she goes home with another boy whose name she will not think to learn. And in the wild nights that follow she will quickly forget the wasp in Tulsa and laughing in Henderson, and all he will remember is kissing her in Albuquerque and the feel of her hand on his back outside Winchester.

ODE

PART ONE
now i can swallow the stars whole and the jagged pieces won't cut my throat. my jaded thoughts and your jaded words and sometimes it was ok but most often was not. half-assed fragments and indifferent city scapes and we won't get out when we have the chance because the lights outside aren't cold enough yet. these yesterdays cancel out the moonlight but only because we can't see the stars through our tears. we'll drown in the glamour of small town life with the big city personality. you let me cut out the horizon halfway during the darkness. they said we wouldn't make it and this is(n't) what we deserve. sh*att*er*ed maybes, but i'm not really sorry. music from next door and superstars dreaming they're real. serenade the streets, or just the people walking them. they lost the fire too soon and we didn't try hard enough to stop them. i don't know how long i'll last or if i even will. you didn't miss much, but i did. i won't let it be over without you.

PART TWO
i didn't know where to go when you left so i decided not to go anywhere. the city almost doesn't look so bad. at night the moon hangs over the river which isn't as dirty as it used to be. i don't think that this is what i'm supposed to be doing but it's too late to stop and nobody cares anway. the stars used to be angry but the cold came and froze them sober. my handwriting looks like someone i used to know but since it's over now, the river came back. i was angry at myself until i remembered to blame you and everything almost seems like it should be. not really ok but we can pretend for sake of memory. i miss hazy summer nights because they remind me of you. sometimes i smell fireflies and i can't see through my tears to read your expression in the picture. you said nothing was ever fast enough for me but now you're sleeping on hollywood avenue park benches and i'm always at our river and i wonder if i've slowed down yet. i guess i have since you're coming back but maybe you've just sped up.

PART THREE
arch over angel and sometimes i'm under. the broken hearts meet palpates of cedar and if you turn around there's no place to go. everyone is swimming around and around and i just go right through because they can't see past me anyway. stoned looking boiz and unhappy gurls and they work well together because we only see what they aren't. i miss the days of purple sunsets in july when it was hot before the sun came home and sweat rose off the river. sometimes the horizon swallowed downtown lights but most often was pushed away by the glow. citycitycity and we're stuck here even though we can escape. i was too afraid to leave but you weren't and got out before the sucking pulled me all the way in. you lied when you told me you'd never let go but i lied too because i'm still in love with you. i promised i'd wait forever and it's forever and i'm still waiting. when the truck faded west into the strangled highway stained with oil and tears i stood behind and knew you'd be back. staple the pieces together because you're finally coming home.