Stretch

I look at my neck in the bathroom mirror. Turn my head side to side to watch the muscles extend. Run my fingers up and down the ventricles that beat under the skin. I look for a mark, a bruise, a scratch. I look for any proof of presence, a body of evidence. I check down to my collar bone, over the soft spot between it and my shoulder(my favorite place to be kissed, though I would never tell you). I stretch my neck upward and lean my head back- nothing.

Do I want there to be something? Do I want the capillaries to be bursting under the skin where your mouth lay? Where your teeth grazed over the flesh? Do I want there to be a print where your fingers laid? A palm shape left where your hands rested, combed, rushed over? Am I looking for the symbol of the moment, of the realization that it happened, that it was true? Do I want the physical demarcation of passion, of memory, some small fragment of some shared night that may never happen again?

Nothing.

I peel off my clothes to climb into bed, and I think I can smell you. But i've changed clothes, I've taken a shower, and I know that it isn't true. Do I know what you smell like?

This room is so quiet, the apartment is so cold. I dig myself under the blankets, tuck my toes under the sheets, and run my hands down underneath me to cultivated body heat. I turn off the light and there I am, in the familiar bed, soft sheets, over-fluffed comforter, soft light coming in from the parking lot outside.

All this time, and I'm still not used to sleeping alone.

Has it been that long?

I run my fingers along my neck again, feeling my heart beat through my throat. To think there's all this thick blood running through me right underneath this thin membrane, blood that's moving much too fast, blood that's weakened the heart, blood that travels to the limbs that travels to the brain that sends nerve impulses across the synapses to back to the heart that makes me think of you.

Think of nothing.

I used to be afraid to sleep in rooms this dark.

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