I remember distinctly the question that still lingers here, even despite the amount of time that has passed since that day, chalk full of false smiles and little white lies.

How are you doing?

I wish people wouldn’t ask. Partly because people only hear what they want to hear, and partly because I hate having to lie to their face.

Honestly I wanted to tell you that everything is perfect.

That time doesn’t reach us and we’re happy this way.

But, then I’d have been lying and we’d only be straight back to square one.

The steps of a relationship like ours go something along the lines of fascination, lust, disillusionment, rage, then the inevitable falling apart. And the worst fact of the matter is that I know it.

I know that by the time I’ve memorized the curve his spine and the shape of his palm, and learned that it takes a half step forward and the touch of a tip-toe to reach his lips; the attraction will fade. Disappear the same way that handprints do against foggy windows.

Kris is a sort novelty for me and I am just another plaything for him. And, although neither of us say it, it’s louder than any of the words we’ve ever exchanged.

And, even though I’ve truly been trying hard to make all of this feel real— because it does.

I get jealous, and angry, and push him away and scream words of “We’ve over”, because it’s real.

It stings like it’s real. And, it aches because it’s real.

Yet nearly not real enough.

Because I remind myself that: One— we haven’t broken up yet. And, two— there’s nothing to break up in the first place.

I’ve begun to diagnose this stage as the prelude to disillusionment.

Somewhere between hinting “I love you”s and leaving behind traces of “I’m Sorry”s on unforgiving lips, do I realize that I’ve really lost it this time.

Is there any way to turn back when we’ve already come this far?

I mean, really. What kind of sane woman allows this sort of thing?
He’s probably one of the most transparent aspects of my life, at present. As if he could slip beyond my reach at any given moment and then the end.

Kris is unstable, or maybe we both are. And, it’s frightening in the most alluring of forms.

Because I’m looking for nothing more than love and he’s looking for someone that’ll heat the sheets for the night. Is that the only thing I’m good for?

He dodges questions like “Are we in a relationship or not?”, but tightens his grip on my hands when Kai gets a little too close. A lame excuse of “I don’t trust him around you.” leaving those thin lips that I’ve grown attached to kissing.

What bull is that?

Kris has a talent in the art of mixed signals and I follow.

Because they’re the only traffic lights I know.

One morning when I wake up, he’s standing in my kitchen with my apron tied around his hips and I recall that He hates Hello Kitty, but manages to tolerate it none-the-less.

He’s hunched over the stove, spatula in hand, attempting to fry eggs for breakfast. But, Kris is a terrible cook, so in the end he sits on the counter and stares me down as I cook instead.

But, rather than eating the eggs and ham the day becomes punctuated by wrinkled sheets and tips of noses gliding over ridges of  my spine, prickly fingertips soaking up sparks and tired bones unwinding into each other. I decide that maybe he’s worth the ache.

Because I am about over working myself to the bone. With long shifts at the restaurant and late nights spent hunched over an artwork. But, Kris is all about the correct way to entangle his arms around my waist and his knuckles in my hair (and that's just about the only thing he's about).

So, I inhale him, then exhale heartache.

Because the next morning he’s nowhere to be found.

It’s November now and winter is on its way. I feel as though the season that breathes life into me has passed far too quickly. Here it is, only the second week, and already the trees are bare of leaves of orange and gold.

Winter—I feel— is a lot like Kris.

It’s beautiful and enchanting, but in the most damaging of ways. It shows up out of the blue and leaves behind a touch so jarring that you can feel it under your skin, even when it’s gone.

Kris is like a blizzard. He is never a constant. He comes and goes like seasons, and leaves in his wake a touch you can’t quite shake.

He’s like a draft of freezing air, especially when the door slams closed behind him and he doesn’t come back through it for weeks— or was it months?

It’s my least favorite disappearing act.

            We don’t talk about it. For the most part it’s because I feel that if I push him, he’ll disappear again. After all, he and I are one in the same in this situation.

He and I are made for each other in that way, that twisted star-crossed lovers kind of way.

Sometimes we fight about it. Because he’s as unstable as a rickety shack and I’m constantly telling him that This is just a fling, Kris.

Even if I want it to be more than that.

He’s the one that reminds me that This was supposed to be a one-time thing.

We laugh.

That’s what we said the first time, and the time after that, and the time after that.

At some point it loses its voice, but occasionally it creeps its way up my spine, into my ear, and straight to my heart. It brings the ache with it.

I fight back desperate pleas of “please don’t leave” and he bellows, fist shooting forward and sinking barren knuckles into the plaster of the wall.

By self-diagnoses, I realize that this stage is rage.

            When I’m sorry I say it by kneeling by his side and telling him straight out.

I feel bad, because his heart knuckles are bruised and it’s my fault.

When Kris is sorry, he doesn’t know how to say it with words. So he says it with his skin. Because he thinks that it’s the only thing he’s good at and that I don’t understand anything, but I can see more than that about him.