hi.

sometimes missing you wells up in me.

it has ebbed, some, so that now, at least, i am not drinking myself into broken memories wherein i find myself, on the floor, singing to the ceiling.

this is not to say the urge is not still in me. it is. i thought, for example, tonight, about how i missed you.

the first instinct, after thinking that, is to pass out. to sleep. to drink until i am stupid(er) and lose those next eight, ten hours, to bring me closer to whatever it is i need to be closer to.

but there's no alcohol and i don't want to be that person.

the next instinct is to take pills, but they don't work, and i find myself on a ledge i know too little about.

and so, instead, i read. i read on the couch, i read in parking lots, i read in a bath tub late at night.

i get in my car, stop at a gas station, get a soda and some candy bars, and sit.

and read.

i miss you, though.

and so i do stupid things. reignite friendships that should stay buried and dead. let the one person who could break my heart a million times over break it one more time again.

because it's easier if it's her breaking me than my memories of you. i fucked up, i fucked up pretty damn bad, and so maybe she's my punishment. self-inflicted heartache.

i want you to be happy. i want you to be where ever you are right now, with whomever you're with, and be smiling. be laughing.

and maybe it's selfish of me, maybe it's wrong, completely wrong, but i want to be a part of your happiness.

i'm a fool though, right?

a damn fool who lost the best thing to have ever happened to me.

in that movie you fell in love with she said come home and he dropped everything and came home.

and you, in your stoic, realistic way, gushed about it. and then you, in your way, called it silly because it would never happen to you.

i should've told you, then, that i would come home whenever you asked me to.

and so i'm telling you, now, that i will.

i'm sorry, emily. i'm sorry.

as always,