2004

(*) Hey!

(*) Want to study for this test together?

2005

(*) There’s a reason I got in your golf car and not his out there. I’ve been wondering what it would be like to be alone with you since you asked my name in Algebra II.

2006

(*) Just sitting that close to you made me feel things I know I shouldn’t. When your hand grazed my leg, was it an accident? I know it’s wrong to say I didn’t want you to stop, but I met you first.

(*) Was it just me today or is something happening? Can you feel it too? Could he tell?

(*) I’m counting up all the reasons I shouldn’t be thinking about kissing you. Him and her don’t seem to be enough.

(*) My parents are out of town. If you came over, nobody would have to know.

2007

(*) That kiss has wiped out the memory of every first kiss that ever came before it. Pretty sure the ones that will come after it, too.

(*) We’re both here now. I’ve missed you. I am excited to be in the same college town as you.

(*) I wanted you to stay tonight.

(*) Next time don’t fuck me and leave.

(*) You make me feel used.

(*) I thought you were my friend. I thought you cared for me. You’ve really hurt me this time.

2008

(*) I need to be held.

(*) I miss you. I need someone to speak to.

(*) I feel like some dirty secret you keep.

(*) FUCK YOU.

(*) I think about you all the time, but I’m just a name on some list to you.

(*) Thanks for being there for me last night. It means more than you know.

(*) You’re one of my best friends.

2009

(*) Do you think we could ever be more than friends who fuck?

(*) She’s insanely pretty.

(*) When you put your hands around my throat, how did you know?

(*) … FUCK. That was the savage kind of sex I’ve fantasized of having with that part of you I’ve been coveting since we met. I knew it was there.

(*) I wish you would have stayed.

(*) Listen to “Gravity” by Sara Bareilles.

2010

(*) It was good seeing you today. I’d missed you. I’m sorry I left so soon, I was afraid of what I might do.

(*) … I don’t trust myself with you.

(*) Come over.

2011

(*) How’s law school?

(*) I’m visiting my parents this weekend. Want to grab a drink?

(*) If I was a normal girl with the kind of dreams every girl has, I would be happy to be with him. I would be content with someone who commits themselves to me this way. He wants to marry me, you know? It would be so much simpler if I was someone else. But no matter how much I play the part, I can’t seem to become the role.

2012

(*) I hate that we’re never single at the same time.

(*) You really love her, don’t you? She’s the only one you’ve ever stopped yourself for. I’m not going to lie, it stung, but I’m proud of you for not going any further and choosing to be faithful. I hope you work out things between the two of you. I want you to be happy.

(*) What does she have that I don’t?

(*) I hate you.

(*) I started writing again today after so long, and every word I wrote was about you.

(*) … In every way, I always come back to you.

2013

(*) I’m drinking Red Stripes. Every time I do I think about those nights on your porch on Krenek Tap, chain smoking cigarettes and rolling blunts. I MISSSSS YOUUUUU.

(*) How have you been?

(*) Don’t slide into my DM’s when you can just text me.

(*) I miss you too.

(*) I love him. I do. I’m still thinking of you.

(*) … Do you think about me too?

2014

(*) You don’t miss me. You’re just bored now that she’s gone.

(*) Are you going to welcome me back to Houston with a proper drink?

(*) Thank you for saying that, but I don’t think anything will need to be shelved for now. It doesn’t matter where him and I stand.

(*) Last night I could sense you before I even saw you. I turned around, and there you were, waiting for your drink and looking around for me.

(*) … It took me forever to strip myself of any feelings for you. But one look from you, and you undo all of that, you beautiful fuck.

(*) … I was wet before you even sat down.

(*) I can still feel your palm on my jaw. And I’m still so fucking turned on.

(*) Wow. That was fast. Another one who was good enough when I wasn’t to add to the list.

(*) The first few moments we’re together, I can always sense how nervous you are beneath your skin. There’s a slight trembling in your voice and your body. I love knowing I have some kind of power over you, too.

(*) Do you only want me when you’re bored?

(*) You simultaneously worship and desecrate me. In your hands I’m holy. I don’t want to be anywhere else.

(*) I love you.

(*) I want to suck you out of my blood like venom from a snake bite, spit you out on the grass, and walk away intact.

(*) I can’t see you for a while. We’re getting back together. We can still talk, though.

2015

(*) Do you ever think about what it would be like between us?

(*) Will we ever learn to stay away from each other?

(*) I had missed your touch, your passion, your violence.

(*) I’m so fucking nervous every time before seeing you. I have to make myself take deep breaths. I have to force myself to stop shaking. But then I’m with you, and it feels like coming home.

(*) When your belt is coming down on me, I want to scream at you to never stop. Sometimes I want to push you, provoke you, pull the strings with my hands tied, and ask you if that’s all you’ve got. As much as it already hurts, I want you to give me more. I want you to break skin. I want a wound I can pick. It aches when I want you and you’re not here. I want it to sting in all the places you’ve been, too. Give me something tangible. Give me something I can hold. Make me bleed for you. Next time, don’t stop at the bruise.

(*) You can’t just come back into my life and fuck my heart up.

(*) Play “Is There Somewhere” by Halsey.

(*) Do you mean what you said tonight?

(*) … I’ve loved you for a long time.

(*) I believe you’re my fate, too.

(*) The best moments of my life have been ones like last night that I’ve shared with you. I’ve never felt more alive than when you touch me. And it’s so fucking ironic because sometimes it’s so difficult to live in the moment when I’m with you, because as the moment is happening, I know it will be taken from me. When you’re holding me, or we’re caressing each other, after, I’m desperately clinging to you. Last night, when you asked me what I was thinking, I didn’t know how to tell you I was bartering with time. That I was trying to think of some deal I could make to keep us in our little world forever. I was pleading for the moment to never end. I was pleading for you not to be taken from me.

(*) I’m sorry for the scratch. I’m sure it’s nothing you won’t be able to explain away. I guess on some level I wanted to draw blood. I wanted to take something from you, too.

(*) … Maybe I wanted to take something from her, as well.

(*) That was the last time I’ll ever see you, wasn’t it?

(*) The way you are with me. The way you speak to me. The words you say. The way you touch me. Everything about you towards me is so vital and so direct. You cut through all the bullshit. You cut through all my bullshit.

(*) ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME? It wouldn’t be respectful for me to sleep in the bed she lies in when she spends the night? But fucking me perversely and mercilessly on it sits well with you? That shit hurt.

(*) … Tonight, I felt like a whore. And you know, I never thought there was shame in being one. But tonight, after you practically asked me to leave, I felt like a worthless sex object.

(*) No one has ever made me feel as adored as you, and no one has made me feel as cheap, either.

(*) What does she have that I don’t? What have any of them had that you couldn’t find in me?

(*) You know, if you were free, I probably wouldn’t be getting back together with him again.

2016

(*) Can you please just stay gone?

(*) I just reread Siddhartha again. xoxo, your Kamala

(*) I need you… I need my friend. He’s not that good of a guy. There’s no one else I can talk to about this. I don’t know what’s real and what isn’t anymore. I feel like my reality is skewed.

(*) I would never push your hand away like she did. I’ve wished for your hand to hold more times than I can count.

(*) Why does even JUST TALKING to you feel like I’m cheating? Do you feel like you’re doing the same?

(*) I wrote a poem about you last night while he lay asleep in the next room.

(*) Some nights, I get into bed next to him and feel like I could die. I lie awake, close my eyes, listen to him breathing, put my hand on his chest and imagine that he is you.

(*) I’m in a big beautiful cabin in the Smoky Mountains. The pantry is stocked with wine. The view is unreal. But everything feels so wrong because it’s not you with me here.

(*) Last night was everything I’ve ever wanted any Christmas to be.

(*) … We could spend every Christmas together, if you wanted to.

(*) I told him I fell off a bike to explain the bruises. I don’t feel guilty at all. Do you?

(*) I don’t feel like I’m cheating on him, it’s being with him that makes me feel like I’m being unfaithful to you.

(*) You don’t want me because you can’t have me. You want me because I’m yours.

2017

(*) You’d never do something like that for me, would you? You’d never bleed for me. I may have made you nervous enough to make you forget where you had put your car keys, but when your fist went through that window, all you could think about was losing her – having to explain where you’d been. I guess that’s the thing about lust versus guilt. I guess that’s the difference between wanting one thing and loving another.

(*) My leaving him had nothing to do with you, but this is our chance. We’ve fucked up time and time again, let’s not let it slip away from us now. This is me asking you to make the choice I never asked you to make. I’m asking you to choose me.

(*) Why did saying goodbye to you tonight feel like the last time?

(*) … To be honest, it always feels like that. It’s a kind of death to kiss you goodbye.

(*) I wish you would have asked me to stay the night. I don’t even remember what it feels like waking up next to you.

(*) It’s 3 AM and I’m on my bedroom floor wanting to just make everything stop. You say you’re always there for me. But are you, really? I can’t text or call. Not outside business hours.

(*) I guess it’s easier to miss me than it is to love me.

(*) Listen to “Grey” by EXES. Then play it again. LISTEN.

(*) I swore I’d never let you fuck me up again, but here we are.

(*) I feel like a mistress that doesn’t get any of your dick or time.

(*) Come to Austin, I’m here.

(*) Do you care about me at all? I feel like all I am to you is a doll who’ll arrange and rearrange her parts the way you want her to.

(*) I know she doesn’t deserve to have her heart broken. No one does. But while you’re busy protecting hers, you’re breaking mine.

(*) There’s a couple at the park reading a book together while lying on each other. We’ll never hold hands on the street or share food in a restaurant, will we?

(*) I know I love you because what I feel for you sometimes is too much for my body to hold. Tonight I can feel it overflow and spilling out through my chest and fingers and eyes and toes. It’s drowning me. I can’t hold you within my skin. I love you. I love you and it fucking hurts.

(*) I want you beyond caution or reason.

(*) You love me? Just not enough to take me regardless of the consequences.

(*) I feel so empty today. Please come hold me just for a little while.

(*) I’m spiraling.

(*) I can’t have you in my life and not be with you.

(*) You can’t reach me. Your number is blocked. I’m sorry. I had to.

(*) I’m alone and stoned as fuck in Portland. Wish you were here stoned with me.

(*) First year that you don’t wish me a happy birthday in I don’t know how long. It hurt.

(*) I’m at my dad’s ranch, lying on the bed of a pick up truck, right now, looking up at a cloudless night sky. There’s a myriad of stars pulsing at this hour, you can’t feel anything else out here. They’re everywhere, shining and twinkling, I swear I could pick one if I just reached. I feel like I’m floating somewhere on the edge of our solar system. When I was little, I liked to think it was the world’s way of telling me the universe was laid out in front of me. That everything was possible. I grew to find comfort in the fact that I was a part of something so much bigger than myself. All my sorrows, my problems, the rage, the tears, this fucked up world, what does any of it matter in the larger scheme? We are but a grain of sand. Tiny, yet big in our own way. I find it beautiful. I find it terrifying. Yet, tonight, all I can think of are all the things that had to happen over the course of billions of years for you and I to be here, on this earth, at the same time, and how sad it is to have to live apart under the same sky. Somehow, that’s more terrifying. I’ve been lying here with no one but the stars and the moon and the wind and everything else that comes out in the night, and I have not been able to dry my eyes. I’d like to think the stars are winking at me, telling me we’ve sat beneath them together in a different time, promising me we will sit beneath them together in another life. I’d like to think there’s a world out there somewhere where you’re stroking my hair in bed. I’d like to think of us in a parallel universe making love until we pass out. Please tell me anything is possible.

(*) Happy New Year, love.

(*) Have you even noticed my absence?

2018

(*) Do you ever think about me when you’re drunk?

(*) I dyed my hair blonde today. What do you think?

(*) … *inserts selfie*

(*) … I guess I wanted to be something you didn’t like. I wanted to be someone you wouldn’t recognize.

(*) Can you hear the thunder from where you are? I can’t sleep.

(*) I’ve got to stop writing about you.

(*) What was the point of replying to my email and thanking me 10 months too late for wishing you a happy birthday? WTF!? What is it that you want? Is this you knocking on my door again? What? Are you two having problems?

(*) They’re playing “Do I Wanna Know?” by Arctic Monkeys at this bar and I am hiding and trying not to cry in a bathroom stall.

(*) I know you meant everything. I know you did. I can’t stop thinking of you, as much as I have tried. Please tell me it’s been hard for you, too. I’m begging you to please corrupt all decency for this love to be something we can live. For you to rest your hand on the small of my back at a bar. To hold my hand in the street. Be selfish, please. I don’t want us both to always mourn what could have been.

(*) I am covered in the shame of your indifference.

(*) I keep having the same dream where we sit out on a porch with a bottle of wine, passing a joint back and forth to each other, and then you carry me to bed. OUR bed.

(*) Happy birthday. I hope you’re smiling, wherever you are.

(*) My birthday wish was you. Again. To have your hands on my body always. This isn’t a craving. This isn’t a fucking itch. It’s a metaphysical yearning that goes beyond all things.

(*) I woke up next to another stranger today, and I want to scream and cry thinking about how I’ll never fuck with more than just my body again.

(*) Do you still read my shit online and on Instagram?

2019

(*) Your number has been unblocked for months now.

(*) Meet me in Denver.

(*) I’m sitting at a window in a coffee shop in Denver. Snow is starting to fall to the ground. It’s the first time in months that I haven’t felt like I’ve wanted to die, but I’m still thinking of you. I suppose that answers my question – I miss you at all times. It would be nice to stand outside with you, catching snowflakes, for a little while. I want to lean my head against something strong. I want to be reminded of your scent.

(*) You’d love this bar.

(*) Fuck this. I’ll have you in my life anyway I can. Cutting you out was a mistake. I’ve been so lonely since.

(*) I want to hurt you. For all the things you’ve done. For all the things you couldn’t do. For all the ways you continue to fuck me up from the other side of this continental divide.

(*) Do you ever miss me enough to drink about me? To light up a cigarette?

(*) What does it feel like to have someone write all these words about you? Can you feel her love, too?

(*) Will you be able to live the rest of your life not ever thinking about how you had me and gave me up?

(*) Maybe we can try being friends again. Without any of the rest.

(*) Maybe I was meant to be left behind. Maybe you were only ever meant to be my muse.

(*) Would you be open to meeting for coffee or a drink somewhere?

(*) Congratulations. I heard about the house.

(*) Your life goes on without me in it, mine has to go on too.

(*) What do you remember about me?