i’ve been so busy lately

You’ve asked me out to lunch, because you miss me, because we haven’t seen each other… lately.

You sounded a little fragile on the phone, arrived that bit too early, then said you hadn’t been waiting long at all.

I’m sorry I kept you.

I asked where you wanted to go, watched you as you watched me, and let my voice slide over you. At first you didn’t respond, just gazing, with the softest smile. Oh I don’t know, where ever you want.

It’s always where ever I want. It isn’t fair. It isn’t fair that you are so afraid of losing me you’ll let me do whatever I want.

It isn’t fair to force me to cut you in this way, so close to the bone. It isn’t fair that I always have to choose. If you had been more decisive, had taken what you wanted, I wouldn’t be sitting here feeling like you are the echo and I am the sound.

I want to find the edges of you, the boundaries to push against, to resist, to challenge, to submit to, in a hundred different little ways. Its how I want to know you, how I want to understand you. Games lose their meaning when you always win. If you never choose, you force my hand.

And so we had lunch, and your knee rested against mine. You brushed my hair out of my face. Your body was looking for the connection that your mind knows is slipping away. Your hands are trying to make me remember. You were talking, I was listening, but only in parts, fading in and out. We’re in a little Japanese takeaway, with fluoro lights and crowded tables. I say let’s go outside, and you think it’s so we can be closer together, but really it’s so I can step away.

I say that I am tired. It’s true, I am. You think it’s just that I work too hard. You don’t understand that this work is like breathing and its being here with you, holding your sorrow in my hands that weighs more with every moment is what is really wearing me out. I might be ruthless in protecting myself, but I take no joy in watching people suffer. I’ll stretch myself to breaking to protect your heart. You wrap your arms around me, but all you are holding is a shell, I’ve long since disappeared.

I live elsewhere at this moment.

It’s time for me to leave. You tell me that I ought to rest, lie down and go to sleep. You don’t understand that I am somewhat asleep now, and that when you are holding me, I’m dreaming that I’m dissolving into the air around you, that when you move your mouth to mine, you’re kissing the mouth of the image of someone you used to know, a pretty picture you’ll hang on the wall for a little while.

You rest your hand on my heart as I tell you that I’m sorry that I have been so busy lately, but that it will be like this, always. I tell you that I’m sorry that I haven’t got more time.