heartburn expulsion

dialogue

and he could feel her big round eyes staring at his face, glossy with earnestness, searching for the words crawling at the back of his throat. that glowing, blush-kissed face was Venus, a gentle, milky globe warming the side of his reddening face, with all the mirth in her gaze shining bronze rays onto his dropped stare. she was pure and transparent as a golden pearl, nestled in raven feathers, bundled in an autumn-knit sweater; should the woven yarn come loose in thick ribboning amber strings, he was certain her marble form would explode and spill out over his lap and into the air, not as petals, but as leaves, soft and lush and evergreen. they'd swirl in the air in an upwards vortex, slinging warm air-vines round his stomach and cheeks, fleeing the earthly confines of this world and back into the celestial sphere where they belong with the unnumbered speckles of stars in the sky. therefore it was impossible to open his mouth and let the words sliming his uvula pass through the safety barrier of his teeth and pierce her soft clay. there was an overbrimming of her extraterrestrial material that would most definitely deflate and die if he let those words itching his tongue ever so much as graze her skin. he swallowed a mouthful of the night air, feeling the cool ball slide down his throat, then turning into bubbles warmed by the churning volcano in the pit of his belly. and when he parted his lips to speak, sulphur curling from the corners of his mouth, he could feel the tingle on the entire right side of his body from her leaning in to capture every single word.

"i just think you're a bit loose with the word."

"what word?" her voice glided through the air, delivered like a glass flute.

he shivered as her voice brushed past his hot ears. "you know... love."

there was a beat, then, "how do you mean?" she asked, slowly.

this was it. he had nowhere else to turn to, no skipping over lines or turning corners to avoid what he had been wanting to say for the past seven days.

he took a breath. "you know when you say that you love people?"

"yeah?" the reply was instant, no hesitation.

"it's just... you say it a lot. to other people. or about other people. you say you love trish, and you love evan, and you love mr lee and you love the dumb goldfish we each got as a class from the field trip to the aquarium and you love earthworms. earthworms."

her eyes were round and shiny as ever. "because i do."

"but how can you love anything and everything? you can't just say you love all these things. it's like you have no degree of how much you like stuff, not love, like. there's no spectrum. you make it a binary- love or hate- and i've never heard you even say you hate anything. all you do is love and love and love." the words were billowing out like train-steam, hot and humid and thick, and when he pulled his head back up to face her, now ligher than before, he could see how she had been steamed by his words, clinging to her skin as condensed droplets do, boiling each freckle into a tumour.

"what's wrong with that?" hurt tinging the edges of her voice.

"because- because you can't just love all the time! it loses its meaning! it's supposed to be intense, and raw, and emotional, and real, and- and- and overwhelming and beautiful."

"and that's how i feel towards all of those people and things you said." the answer was stamped and sent through an airtight tube straight into his soul. clear and honest and so, so naïve. he let out a scoff before he could stifle it. that sound pierced her expression, he could see her wilt in his periphery, then straighten up with a red glow in her eyes.

"you do not tell me what to love and what not to love. i say i love them because i simply do. i think they are wonderful and strange and beautiful. and my heart bursts when i look at them and think how amazingly they are formed and how they fight to live in this world."

"but they're not... they're not special."

"they are to me!"

"no! if everything's so special and amazing to you, then- then nothing really is!"

"what about you then?" those eyes were wild now, a lioness staring into his soul. "i've never heard you say you love anything. you don't even say you love your family. you only say you love me because i say i love you first. you don't even show a smidge of affection towards your friends, or the things you do or buy or see. you don't seem to even like anything."

"yeah, because life isn't super great for me. i don't get a love-filled orgasm every time i look at something cute or quirky."

now it was her turn to choke out a scoff. "wha- how- i don't orgasm like that!"

"yes you do. you get all shrill and hysterical over the stupidest things." now the words were rolling off his tongue, latching onto her sweater and clawing up into her mouth, trying to suffocate her to no comeback.

she stared at him. he began to pinch himself on the inside, wishing he could swallow back the words he said, for her silence was a blade slowly slicing down his side profile. finally, "i don't believe you're so full of disdain."

"yeah? what if i am?"

"do you love me?"

this rapped him in the heart. he looked at her- inky tresses lifting in the wind, eyes wide and wet. that autumn sweater was starting to drip off  her shoulders with heaviness, no longer swollen puffs of cable-knit.

"yes. yes, of course i love you." his voice came out as a croak, rough surfaces scratching the roof of his mouth. but her face remained in that teary wide-eyed glare.

"ok then. why?"

"what- this isn't a time for you to receive validation."

"no, it isn't for me. this is for you. now tell me, why do you love me?"

for him? he let that sink in. she was challenging his love for her, whether it was true and founded and real. he understood that. his mind was racing, little nodes spinning webs of information round his brain. the answer used to be on the tip of his tongue, blissfully professed to his friends, but never to her. and as he reached for the words, he found himself scraping at his throat, scooping liquid from his heart just to find something.