arrears, n. My faithfulness was as unthinking as your lapse. Of all the things I though would go wrong, I never thought it would be that. "It was a mistake," you said. But the cruel thing was, it felt like the mistake was mine, for trusting you.

There are boys so enraptured by love that they can't get their hearts to slow down enough to get some rest, and other boys so damaged by love that they can't stop picking at their pain.

When the shock wears off, you always hope there's understanding underneath.

The world is quieter now. It is never quiet, but it can get quieter. What strange creatures we are, to find silence peaceful, when permanent silence is the thing we most dread. Nighttime is not that. Nighttime still rustles, still creaks and whispers and trembles in its throat. It is not darkness we fear, but our own helplessness within it. How merciful to have been granted the other senses.

By the time I got there, you’d already decided. And I quickly decided to let you decide. You were already seeing the rooms as ours, and that was enough for me.

But I think we were walking around like we were invincible. And maybe that's a bad way to live your life. Because you're not invincible. Nobody is. And maybe now that we've learned that, we'll be better.

But if I didn’t want to be alone, then why didn’t I want to be with anyone else?