to the devil, from a ghost.

Bridge

"If all the others jumped off a bridge, would you too?"

She asked.

Little did she know I already had.

Leapt, before my time, into the crashing abyss of

What I thought was "love".

Pulled along by a then-best-friend away from the

Solid ground of singularity. The steel beam of detachment.

Independence.

Pushed by peer pressure into the empty void too soon.

Falling falling falling fast I latched on

to the first person I could find.

The one that hurt the least.

Discourse ensued, but then I absconded

Without visible bruising.

Reborn, then, on an even plane.

Blue and uncaring. Ignorant. Free.

But twelve months passed and the stress came back.

No pull, only push. The push to be Normal™

And once again I snatched the nearest

Beanpole. For substandard support

That lasted all of a winter's chill.

Cold and empty without so much as a single kiss.

An awkward non-event. A sign, ignored.

The end of that semester I was

Starving.

Starving myself and starving for attention.

I fell in love with the IDEA of him and when I finally saw his face

My heart was beating too loudly in my ears to make sense of

Anything.

An idealistic fictional long-distance shitpost

That ended in a lonely bathtub on a rainy Friday night

Over text.

It was summer then

but as the days grew colder I was torn apart.

He glued and nailed me back together -

that is, when he wasn't building guns.

Our lips met once but it was

cold

and dry.

And the rest of that day was fear fear fear fear fear.

I left him for my mental health.

Still hungry for a happier view of myself

and in a concerto of emotions I missed a note:

"Never mind I'll find someone like you."

She woke me up; she led me on,

but I let go and was happy then I think.

Back to the room where it all began.

Not caring. Content alone.

Immune, at last, to the pushiness of my generation.

Then she grabbed my hand and dragged me excitedly

towards the yellow taqueria with such gusto

and for the first time I felt PULL.

From that day on I followed like a dog.

Four burritos, one kiss, and a dozen cuts later

we spooned on the hospital bed.

They screamed.

"THIS IS ME!" I yell, once she's gone and the lights are out.

They stare me down and I give

The ultimatum.

"This really is me. I'm done with push. I won't be shoved around any more.

I feel the pull of truth, of fate. This is RIGHT.

And if you push me back down -

Then maybe I'll jump off that bridge after all."