| Saturday, March 31, 2007 |
| sleeping with ghosts |
But the worst thing, the very worst, is when at night and into the morning, when I stand on the edge of the cliff between being awake and asleep, he comes to me. I lie there on my side, a pillow tucked under my leg, and I see him next to me. I see him, and if I reach far enough into my memory, I remember what it felt like when we touched. I remember the waves of heat that radiated from him into me, the only thing in my life that never failed to interrupt anything I was doing or thinking. I remember, and I imagine what it would feel like to actually have him here, holding me at night. I cling desperately to his heat, reaching out into the past, searching for every memory of it, of him, but I know something is missing. The thing I want so intensely to remember never happened. I see him wear that playful, mischievous smile, and I see now a cruelty in the upturned corner of his mouth as he teases me with his presence in this bed we never shared.
And I know in my desperation that I must not move, that this image is contingent on my obeying that one simple rule: don't move. But just when I can almost feel his breath on the back of my neck, I fail. I breathe, I gasp, I shudder, I convulse: I stumble and I fall. He vanishes, he is gone, and I can almost hear him say goodbye. |
posted by La Malinche @ 11:47 PM   |
|
|
|
