I don’t know how to think for myself. My mind is loud with thoughts that never belong to me. I turn the desires of others into thoughts of my own. Is this what I want? It’s been so long and I can’t tell the difference. I’m afraid to be the reason someone leaves. Afraid that a “no” will sound too much like rejection and too much like unlove. I let people take pieces of me, hoping it’s enough to mak...

An inaccurate version you clung to like truth, but what I held of you was real. So how did we switch places? You named me difficult, distant, cold, but I never was. I believed in a false image of you because I buried the truth of you. I saw you, the real you, but I ignored it because the truth was too selfish, too much, too cruel. I was quiet but I was not blind. You did everything you say I did. ...

Your weight crushed my ribs as your fingers surrounded my throat. Your actions were a cold reminder that love was never what you meant. Your hands moved intently, and they knew the path too well. They tightened, and I felt the familiarity of someone who once held me gently. I searched for you. I searched for the part of you I knew, but it was replaced by something I couldn’t begin to recognize. I ...

I reached out my hand as the distance between us grew rapidly. A part of me was slipping away and I could no longer grasp it. The light was fading as I followed behind your towering figure. Your presense now failed to offer comfort. Motivated soley by my love for you, I persisted down your path. The unknown journey led me deeper. Our footsteps echoed in the silence as my heart grew weaker. Your ne...

The world went black, and then I woke up. I was back in the house as if I had never left. I saw my wife rushing down the hallway, desperate to know if the gunshot she heard was just a dream. She creaked the door open and heard me gargling on the blood filling my mouth. She stumbled back, her face pale as she dialed for our oldest daughter. I wanted to comfort her, to reach out, but I couldn’t catc...

My grandfather shockingly discovered his cold, lifeless body downstairs on the couch, next to the various packages of pills and syringes. I remember my dad making me sit on the chair in the quiet, sunlit living room. He whispered to me in a concerned voice, “Josh is dead.” Did I care at all? No. I was 11 years old at the time, and three years later his loss had finally hit me. I had not a single t...

My alarm immediately woke me, as it does every morning. I turned it off when I shockingly heard my parents rush toward my room. They opened the door and gazed directly at me. They looked as if they were dazed and hadn't slept in years. Their faces were pale and tight as if they had just climbed out of a cold stream of water. They were trembling. They never even uttered a word before they left my r...