I take my time because I love how it feels to carry her, the way she needs me, the way I need to protect her.

I don't believe that. I don't believe that there are bad things about you. Only things that you think are bad.

Life is full of luck, like getting dealt a good hand, or simply by being in the right place at the right time. Some people get luck handed to them, a second chance, a save. It can happen heroically, or by a simple coincidence , but there are those who don’t get luck on a shiny platter, who end up in the wrong place at the wrong time, who don’t get saved.

I cling to him like he's what keeps me thriving. Because he is.

I write the word solitude on my wall and then below it: Do you know me at all? Are my words just air? Is my heart easy to spare?

Maybe if I try hard enough, we'll fall into each other and become one single person and we can share our pain instead of carrying it by ourselves.

So I let my shame own me, kill me, wilt me away into a thousand dead flakes, knowing if I kept it all in, she would never have to learn the dirtiness that was forever inside me--the bad, the ugly, the twisted. She could go on living her life happy, just like she deserved.