If you’re still here

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 Last night I went out with my friends

And thought maybe I’d see you like those times before 

It would be serendipitous

Almost like a small wink from the universe.


I danced and laughed

And when someone put their hands on my waist I slipped away.

I whispered conspiratorially into my friend’s ear that I still felt a little bit like yours,

Which is like a cruel ironic twist when the scene is contrasted with our last interaction.


Last night, 

A boy asked to buy me a drink which I declined

And my friends later caught him trying to put something in my water from underneath the table.

I know it’s odd but in that moment I thought of us draped against one another in the hallway of the nightclub waiting out the cold before the car came.

You promised that you would always protect me,

Something you reiterated that night in bed just after you rubbed my back on the bathroom floor while I threw up.


But last night I was not being held loosely in your arms as we pinky promised to be best friends,

I was standing in front of a boy whose face was inches from mine making veiled threats.

For a moment I wished that you were there,

But then remembered our last interaction and the silence in all the days that have followed.

And somehow I’ve anchored myself to the thought that maybe this is you protecting me the only way you know how.


Lately things seem less purple,

Less like lucky pennies and pinky promises, or sunflowers.

Really everything feels more like sound of your screen door when it closed between us for the last time.






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