Go backUntitledby Lumpkinz11
CW mental health issues, talk of death/murder, cigarettes/alcoholwords didn't flow from my mouth like they did hers. she told me stories until it was
two in the morning, stories that shooed away the men that lurked in my thoughts
every night. she loved me. truly loved me. she was there for me, to calm me when
i need it, to make me feel safe when i didn't, to save me from the end when i was
about to welcome him. she was the light to my darkness. i remember, one dark morning,
she asked me, in a voice barely above a whisper, what my biggest regret in life was.
i told her, our fingers laced together, it was not killing her sooner.
-
i've been calling her quincy since i met her at the boys and girls club. she was seven,
i was six, and we had been friends back then. last week, she told me she'd be there for
me, always. i had my problems, she said as she held my hands, and she said she'd stay for
me. maybe now, looking back, she might have not known that “me” meant my problems
too, every single one of them. maybe i hated her, even when she loved me like she did.
she was different, she could live her life with someone who loved her, and would want a
future with her, and yet she wasted her life. she eventually lost her life, staying for me.
if she'd asked me what my biggest regret was now, at this moment, i would look down
and whisper, it was how she died.
-
I had been walking home with quincy as she whispered to me about a woman who had
eleven toes, and the extra toe gave her powers. her name was Jupiter, she said tugging
my hand away from the camp. red faced, the counselor handed me a note, politely explaining
to my father how i [messed] up that day. my hands soaked the envelope with sweat, as i
clutched it against my fast-beating heart. at least, for that moment, i had her, and jupiter,
and for the mean time, i felt...like the end was not so close anymore
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me, quincy, and jupiter stood over the sewage grate, my note nearly crushed in my hand.
bending over, i shoved it through one of the openings, the note, and my lingering fear, had
fluttered to the water below. Jupiter assured me it was for the best. quincy just grabbed my
hand and spoke to me of jupiter's younger sister, sweet clementine. i was no longer afraid.
-
they called her john quincy adams almost all the time. she'd cry to me, telling me her name
wasn't even quincy. when she told me her real name, i didn't even listen. to me she would
always be quincy. to me, she would never be anything but quincy. just like jupiter would always
be jupiter, even if people called her ‘imaginary’. and quincy's stories would always be stories,
and her characters would always be just characters, even if still today i can hear jupiter in
my head, telling me things quincy would have said. even if i see sweet clementine and
Dennis and even Alan standing at the foot of my bed, watching me. these walls were just
walls, all this metal was just metal, and these words were just words and her love was just
love and i am nothing. quincy was just nothing. just someone who loved me. i could never
be more than nothing and she could be anything. could've been anything. she loved me, and
i killed her. death is just death, and now she is as much nothing as i am.
-
looking up, i was [mad] at his height. looking down at everyone, even if he wasn’t that much
of [a jerk] . the way he grabbed her waist when they danced, how she bit her lip, how the only
time he let go of her was to push her loose, dark hair behind her ear. i never understood why
her face was always a deep red when she caught up with me later. i never understood why she
called me a fool, incapable of love, when i asked why she felt like she was shaking, how the
heat radiated off of her, after she danced with him. maybe it was how i said it, my face screwed
up, eyes drawn narrow, nose held up like i had smelled a foul odor. i had, her perfume. there was
too much, i felt she had taken a bath in it before i knocked on her door, her face screwed up like
mine had. she fixed my tie, and my cuffs, as we walked to the school. it was a different feeling,
walking in with her, holding my ticket tightly in my hand. I bet i soaked through the paper when
Alan had taken it from me. he gave me a nod, a mix of “nice catch boy,” and “don't [mess] this
up kid,”. i smiled in return, probably caused by how much my lungs swelled, how it felt as my
heart was constricted when he nodded. i think often off that night, how much quincy had danced
with him, how much i wished i could have done the same. quincy called me jealous, of her I
guess. or her date. it was neither. i was jealous of the girl who draped herself over Alan, angered
by how uncomfortable he looked, and how she was so intent on making herself seem desirable.
i was jealous of how he held her waist as they danced, [
REDACTED], one [hand]
holding his cheek, how he had smiled and leaned his head into her hand. i smiled at him, when
he caught me staring, my heart getting trapped again. i didn't care if my heart stopped beating,
i was just...happy...at the cause. he could have been the cause of my demise and i would have
smiled back at him, while he stabbed me, or shot me, or pushed me off a bridge, or whatever.
i would have smiled back, and my heart would have tightened, and my eyes would flutter.
he could have murdered me, in cold blood, and i would have smiled back at him, because
he made me feel some kind of stupid, and all i could was smile when my heart suffocated,
when my lungs would pop, when i saw galaxies when i blinked, when i crumbled and wanted
to scream out and laugh until i was hoarse and run like he was the trophy and i was the racer,
until i couldn't breathe, and everything ached. quincy loved me, and i loved Alan . i never knew
what love was, what it felt like, until i knew alan, and i just wanted to love until i fell apart,
but i couldn’t, because alan had a girlfriend, who was normal and sexy and [
REDACTED]
gorgeous, and quincy had a boyfriend who was courageous and sane and everything she deserved.
and i wasnt anything, just a nobody with nobody and i wanted to scream and cry until i was
nothing but sand and i wanted to hit everything, [
REDACTED]. i doubted alan would ever
talk to me, or [heck], even look at me, after that night, and quincy was sore at me for some
reason or other for months after that. i feel that, when i walked home alone, when no one said
‘good morning’ to me, when no one asked me how my day was, i felt that the world was at
balance. i don’t blame alan, and i sure as [heck] don't blame quincy. i blame myself, for….
everything, everything that has ever happened, for every...death... i've caused, for every
mistake i've made, it's only hurt others. i've only hurt the people who've loved me, and i couldn't
live with myself, but i did-i am-and now i'm alone. alone because...i was loved…
-
it seems the more i talked the less i was heard, the more i asked for help the more i was ignored
-
i was good for 9 years. 9 whole years i didn't get in trouble. i moved out, went to college. i didn't
speak, participate, reach out. i was quiet. i graduated, third of my class. it was a friday night when
i saw him. i’d been free from him for 6 of those years, yet here i was, my heart beating like it wanted
to break free from my chest. second beer halfway down , and he offered to buy me another one.
i tore my eyes away, to act shy or something. i was just terrified. i blinked and it didn't happen.
i didn't see nebulas splatter my sight with their bright hues which always brought me close to tears.
those fingers that brought his beer to his lips, i wanted them to stay away from [me], yet i needed
someone's touch. i was so lonely, and i wanted to hide behind a cigarette outside. he made me laugh,
deep from my core, it radiated out until i was nearly doubled over. he made me laugh in the back
alley when it was so dark i could only see his face if i got really close, and i'm pretty sure our noses
were touching most of the time. i could feel his breath on my lips. [
REDACTED]. just one kiss,
and then i'll run like i always do.[
REDACTED] my head was a ball of cotton. i was dizzy, light-headed,
giddy like a teenage girl. when he pulled away, i tried to suppress a laugh. we had kissed and my lips felt
like fire and i smiled and he smiled back. i can't say i loved him at any point in my life. lust may be a better
word...or would it? i don't know. now whenever i think of dennis my brain turns to cotton. i remember
blinking, and there they were. the galaxies and nebulas i thought i could only see for alan. poor, alan...
we laughed for five minutes, probably out of relief. [
REDACTED quincy would have done the same,
i must tell myself that….it had all been such a blur. my brain is of cotton and i cannot continue. i've never
cried because he died, i only cry because i killed the stars i loved to stare at so much when i closed my eyes.
-
after alan’s accident i picked up smoking. quincy wasn't phased by it; alans...accident….i mean. she was
furious when she found the cigarettes in my sweatshirt. i remember that early winter day. i walked alone
to the town's gas station to buy a pack. her and dennis had broken up, and she moved on quicker than i
thought she would. she always told me to get clean or she'd leave me. being clean had made me feel dirty,
like the dangers i was putting my body in made up for what happened to alan. [
REDACTED] quincy
remarked i looked 40, not barely close to being a teenager. later that week i had decided to catch a train to
[her area]. it felt like i had forgotten what her voice sounded like. my hobby nowadays is getting clean with
her and smoking alone, or maybe smoking right outside her apartment. it made me feel like she had a reason
to still see me. i had started thinking that maybe i should seriously quit. i had called her to ask her to meet
at the train station, and she said she was with her boyfriend. it was okay, and maybe i would quit next time.
-
my mom used to take my hand. we'd jump over sewage grates together. she'd let me stay up late to watch
the stars with her. she'd hold me tightly when we walked to the park. she'd always take my hand and call
me beautiful. we'd drink milkshakes so fast our brains froze. we would laugh and laugh and laugh over
the smallest things. I miss her, and , honestly, I don't know why she left me. maybe it was because she
favored a childless life. maybe it was because she never really loved my father. one day she took me out
to the park and we got milkshakes and raced lady bugs and jumped over every sewage grate and we
stayed up late watching the stars and she held my hand and put it on her heart. her eyes were reflecting
the stars above as she sniffled and tilted her head back. when I woke up the next morning she was
gone, and she never left any explanation. I still jump over sewage grates and race ladybugs and
sneak out to watch the stars, hoping she would come back to join me. but she never has, and I doubt
she ever will.
-
alan was our school's number-one baseball player. in gym, he had saved me from getting a
black eye countless times by catching instead of freezing up like i did. he would talk to me
about his weekend hikes, how one day he just wants to sell everything and live in the woods.
he didn't tell me directly, but you hear a lot when you sit behind him in every single class. a
few months after homecoming, when it was mid-autumn and already leaf-peeping time, i
remember him inviting his girlfriend, me, and quincy on a hike. his girlfriend graciously
declined (in favor to climb mount Dennis) and quincy was vacationing in paris for her french
class. she told me to go, that nothing bad would happen, but it did. something bad
happened and it was all because of me and i never meant to leave him. he was crying
and telling me to help him and i ran away. i ran for hours and hours and didn't turn back.
he told me quincy was attractive, no, “drop dead [
REDACTED] gorgeous” were
his exact words. and i pushed him. [
REDACTED i told him i'd be right back but i
just ran. i ran until my lungs burned and breathing caused me physical pain, and i ached
and gasped like a fish and i sat in the grass and dirt until it was late night and then i kept
running. i remember telling quincy on monday that i chose not to go, and he must have
gone alone, and gotten lost, and they'd find him soon. they did not. not until late august
the next year. [
REDACTED] i remember when it when on the news[
REDACTED]
i heaved for hours after that. i cried and heaved at the thought of the boy who once made
me feel stupidly in love that was now plant fertilizer, all because he complimented quincy
and i chose to kill him. the thought of him now makes my heart feel like lead and i cry,
because i loved him, and i pushed him down the cliff face, and he was a wolf's supper,
and he probably screamed and cried for help and i ran.[
REDACTED] it makes my heart
feel like lead and I'm in deep waters and I can't swim, and I wish I would just drown
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some days it felt like sadness and misfortune were etched into my heart. others, it only
felt like despair. with quincy by my side, i felt subconsciously worried. maybe i was worried
she’d try to talk to me, about some serious things. maybe i was worried she'd leave me. i can't
say whether i enjoyed her company, but she was always with me, so i held my tongue. she
would play with my hair, ‘softest stuff in the world’ she’d say. i always let it grow out too long,
past my ears, then my shoulders, and she’d cut it. she hated my hair long. i couldn't care less.
one day, she was hurriedly snipping away length after length of my hair. it fell to the floor in a
pile by her feet. the scissors grazed my neck and drew blood, she apologized profusely, and i
said i was fine. whether i wanted her company or not, i never knew. maybe i was worried she’d
accidentally hurt me when she was with me. my heart never screamed out in fear when i saw her,
it only grew uneasy, and i took that as a good sign.
-
Its been years. Her eyes didnt know what id been through, who they were seeing. They were
glassy, and it took me a moment to recognize them fully. My skin felt dry, and stretched, the
december air nipped at the skin it saw exposed, tasting its rawness,
Im [sic] okay
I loved her i dont know who she is. She has become this, this. And her eyes were wet, why?
Why do i care, shes here for formality. ‘Weird meeting of old friend’ check. check, check off her list
thank you for meeting me here
I dont like bagels stil i never did. why did she buy me one?
Im worse, i didnt grow i faded i grew sickly [sic] gray [
REDACTED] gray and wilted
Its been hours and she left, hours ago, and she left. I dont know how long ive been here
Its been minutes? They arent closing yet, in fact it just got busy. I see it. Thats when i see it, when
i realize its been hours or minutes or seconds or day, thats when i see Him
*Some phrases/words are altered/redacted to comply with CS guidelines! If there are parts that do not make
sense, it is because I had to remove a few sentences in a row.Go backHelp