standing on a ledge.

It's midnight and my mind is playing tricks on me. Shadows are moving and I can still hear the faint gunshots that ring in my mothers ear. Is it bad that there are still moments where I wish that my heart would just stop?

No, I'm not writing my suicide note.

Yes, I love my life.

But there are days that I think, instead of one finger, it would have been easier for her to take my whole hand. The hand that represents that beating mass in my chest.

What did I really expect, though? Did I expect it to be easy to fall for someone else? Just like that? With a snap of my fingers? Which would be impossible to do anyway if she had taken my whole hand. Talking is supposed to make things easier, correct?

Wrong again, sir.

Talking just helps her understand what she's getting herself into with me. I wonder if, as each conversation ends, she wishes more and more that she had

RUN ...

in the opposite direction when she met me. I never told her it would be easy and I never claimed to be unbroken or that my past (which clearly effects my future) wasn't complicated. I'm a complicated human being. You'd need more than an extensive anatomy class or manual to figure me out. I know and understand that these things take time.

Take an egg and crack it ...

Ok, bad choice of words.

I'm fragile but I'm not scrambled eggs yet.

Better yet, take a rock and hit it against the pavement. Watch it break apart little by little. Watch as each time you do it, it gets smaller and weaker and easier to break. The pavement has done a lot of damage so far. Even the rain can transform me over time. I'm not saying that a drop of water will ruin me but I've seen a downpour or two in my life thusfar. I just want to lay my head down, reach the pillow beneath meand hide under the covers. Just for a day or two. While I let it sit in that I just confessed everything to her in one phone call about my personal pavement, my downpour, my lost finger.

Let it sink in one more moment and ...

Why do I do this to them?

Why did I do that to her?

Another night of shadows and burrying in my pillow.

Hold my breath and ...

JUMP!