therapy

» paper boats

"I miss her. She was the only human being that would understand me. You know, she was the only person I was ever happy with for longer than five minutes. Now she's gone, she's disappeared, faded, all of the verbs that describe a person who no longer exists."

I gave her a weak smile as I looked at how she took in those words and over-analyzed them, waiting for her to give me some hopeless therapy—just tainted words to fix broken vases.

"Have you turned her into a boat?" In return for my puzzled look, she continued, "Turn her into a paper boat and set her out at sea." Her feet made small dents into the carpet as she jolted up and ran to a desk covered in colorful paper. Grabbing some pens, she returned and dumped them onto my lap. "Write what you like about her on these papers."

"Why?" I traced the edges of the paper—their colors mixing in with my own darkening shades.

"So you can finally realize that you shouldn't love someone who is your anchor. Set them free and open up your eyes; for you are at the top of the ship, watching the tiny fish below swim and you are not even liking what you see."

I raised an eyebrow at her but began to scribble down bittersweet words onto the paper. After fifty papers were coated with thick, heavy truths, I handed them to her; together, we made creases and twists on the paper, beautiful twirls until they were shattered into fifty parts. I was unaware as she curled her fingers around mine and pulled me outside, with a bag full of paper boats. We wandered through a park, looking for a stream, but only to find a water fountain.

"We will come back in a week to see that she has disappeared," she stated with certainty as she let the boats loose from the bag. She handed me the last one, where "I love you," was scribbled in sloppy handwriting.

"How can you know for sure?"

"How do you walk by without reaching for a perfectly crafted paper boat? She'll be around the world in a day; far from you, but still here."

I closed my eyes and felt the water glide past my fingertips, swirling around the boat and taking it far, far away.