She sat next to her boyfriend in a wooden pew and her stomach was wrenching. Her fingernails dug into the denim on his thigh to continually reinforce that he was still there beside her. Because Autumn wasn't. It was only half a decade of concrete days. She could barely swallow. But for that time, beyond a shadow of a doubt, she understood what it meant to have someone who would drop everything at 3am to come over and console you over a broken heart risking a snow stuck car that had to be pushed out of a driveway at 5.

There was something divine. In a world of stagnation and glorified laziness lightening broke through a dark grey sky one day to reveal provocation. She answered him, "I just need to teach myself to write with my left hand."Was ambidexterity the cure for insanity? Regardless of that notion these days were filled with productivity. The movie Big acted out as mental maturation. That was the miracle. No voice of God just the notion of over-indulgence that spurred misnomers. She was always out to prove someone wrong. In turn she started to prove herself. Don't let the dishes pile up.

She was drifting in and out of sleep laying on top of her duvet. It was 3 p.m. on this most recent Saturday. The first time in months that was without obligation. It was almost disconcerting. The boy was too far to play and it was raining outside anyway. A techno beat was her only companion. She didn't mind. Everything was handled, under control. Was she over ‘out of control?' Not at all. The object of the game was equal distribution. Even as opposed as she'd become it was nice to remember that there could even be time for naps.

She felt she was owed something. For what? For surviving? For tolerating all the years of verbal and emotional abuse? Every six months it got hard to stomach the lot of them. It was about every six months she was in a room with them. The over-privileged step-siblings. The mother who spoke to her as though she was owed nothing. Because of her failures. Because it was her mother's hard earned money that could go towards boats or the not even blood related child's ivy league education. All she did was survive. Personal progress was diminished by money and faÃÆ'§ade.

Do girls give off a slightly different pheromone when in a relationship? "Is that your bike?- No, I just so happen to have found this key and had a sneaking suspicion it was for this exact bike lock. "Yeah."He's smoking a cigarette and it looked as though he was on the pay phone, "I work across the street; there's nowhere to lock it up there so I just keep it here."Not that I have to explain dick to you. Who are you? "You're cute, though, but I bet you have a boyfriend.- What!? Go away. "They always do.-

"Are you enjoying fighting with him?""No."It‘s a destructive default. She spent years fighting with unresponsive, condescending, abusive men. There was no reason to fight with him. He cares about her in a way no one else ever had. He wants to help her. He wants to be there for her and offer her what she needs. That's why the question was posed. It is a knee-jerk reaction within her subconscious to stir conflict if the other party involved is promoting still waters. Imbalance is a theme. Created or incidental, they stand on opposite sides of the emotional pendulum.

She is sitting at her desk. One round, white pill and one oblong, ivory pill washed down with instant coffee prepared with hot tap water. It's raining outside. This makes her desire to hop on her bike/ start her walk/ leave her house extremely diminished. If her boss owned a cell phone she'd call for a ride. No cars, no cell phones, it's funny how some lives still side-step society-swallowing technology. She wonders what everyone else is doing to maintain sanity. Raindrops reassure in opposition to the headset-wearing, half-man half-machine colony of auto-pilot executives the tri-state area is evolving into.

The campus, at night, looked similar to the old one. Streetlamps pouring yellow light on concrete, the brick buildings with that same academic feel. Though there were distinctions. No columns. No standards. No misconceptions. No magic. She walked away from the Main Hall and a math test with a far removed feeling. Was she doing this for her or was she doing this for them? The great obfuscation of young adulthood. They are not the "them"you're thinking of. She is independent but aware. Different states. Different motives. Different motifs. This student, at night, looked nothing like the old one.

They all lived on the same block. Another couple from the street had come in. "The neighborhood was shocked. She was mothering their three children. It was the internet and drinking that did him in,"an old man commented, now years later, where the topic had no business being made a topic of discussion. The former husband now lives in California with a new wife and business. The ex-wife brings crutches to court and her new boyfriend, who she wouldn't marry in order to maintain alimony. "They were such a happy couple, no one could believe it when they split.-

She was twenty-two, these things are supposed to happen when you're seventeen. Thank God they were in the basement. Thank God her mother had the unchanging habit of yelling throughout the house to announce her presence (normally taken as a sign of her royalty complex). It had been a good day. They lazily watched cartoons and ate pancakes. They played Donkey Kong. She showed him her favorite movie. Such an intense emotion/ concept had never been this easy/ unquestionable. They had broke into a fit of laughter. Sometimes first love comes after first heartache, it feels better to grow young.

Whining is the great American pastime. She became grumpy because another person clarified concerns she was incapable of correcting for her boyfriend. Then he brought up her family. There was always something to complain about when it came to them. By the time she got home her step-mother was whining about a game, the food, having to work. Some woman walking by her window was throwing curses at her cell phone under a gorgeous Sunday evening sky. Her cat is laying in the doorway, he's playing Tetris, and she's decided whining should walk away with the woman on her cell.

His car broke down. She's always broke. Her boss is making huge leaps toward matrimony after three months. Her parents try to force generosity down his throat. Her mind pendulums from perfection to perfect heartbreak like sharp changes in altitude. He's back in his altitude. Where he belongs? Where do "we"belong, she thinks. Her family is overzealous, when they, being a fucking cluster fuck of last names should be most apprehensive. His family is wary, his best friend is wary, some of the people they know don't know they're together. She's heading for a breakdown when they break up.

She's had a conflicted day. Perfect moments bike-riding in beautiful weather. Perfectly annoying moments dealing with classes and other people. She doesn't know what has been bothering her. One idea is that her room is messy. Lately she is only calm when her room is meticulously straightened. The other concern is the emotional eating she's been doing. Why is turning into a woman becoming so stereo-typical? That, in and of itself, may be exactly what's gnawing at her. With The Flamingos playing in the background she feels like she might as well resign herself to a kitchen and perpetual unfulfillment.

Some people just get to you. The color of their eyes. The arch of their eyebrows. The way their words send hot fire throughout you. Whether or not that heat is anger or lust is questionable. Whether or not you want to eradicate it from your mind doesn't matter. Sometimes, no matter how much time passes, they still get to you. The forest fire, however, has diminished to a match spark. She blows the match out quickly, breaks the stick, and throws it out knowing she doesn't want it. She has what she wants, a fire that keeps her warm.

Alice and Robert O'Connor have been married 64 years! Robert is a tiny, hunched-over man who is soft-spoken and can no longer read. His wife, Alice, overcompensates for his subtlety with her explosive commentary and feverish pace. She's the only 84-year-old who's still running despite her years and frail, svelte frame. George, who works at the Post Office, is endlessly annoyed by her senility and boisterous commands and expressions. "Look what you've had to put up," people exclaim to Robert. Alice barks, "You don't know what I've had to put up with . . . you try getting married during the war!"

She wants him to buy her flowers and take her to Dupont for dinner and a movie, a little Italian restaurant and an endearing movie about a broken family overcoming illness and becoming stronger despite differences. She wants him to do that because that's what Andy did. She doesn't want to still recall moments with someone who considered her second rate to a girlfriend, a roommate, an opposite side of the country. She had him now. He treated her better than any boy ever had.She wanted those amazing romantic memories to be with him not some freshman year disappearing act.

She is wearing a black dress over jeans and flip-flips; the weather is in the mid-80s. This afternoon they are off to the Museum of Natural History. Another weekend, she is states from home, trading money for the happiest moments of her life. The people who say long-distance relationships don't work are the people who don't know what's really important. Rather, they are unwilling to work for it. Amtrak values the dollar and she's willing to give them that for what it gives back to her. Weekends of travel can be tedious, but then again so can weekends of repetitive inactivity or worse, repetitive loneliness.

She's home. She's come home to her bills, her laundry, and her drunk mother. Her mother has been standing in the doorway of her bedroom having the same conversation that was held in the doorway of the house not ten minutes ago. Her mother has a pained expression on her face questioning her disinterest. It's hard to be interested in something the second time around when it wasn't coherent the first. She is trying to pawn off a car to her daughter's new boyfriend in another monetary, alcoholic, last ditch effort to make up for twenty-three years of emotional neglect.

Exhaustion flooded her. It was 11:21 on a Monday night, there was no explanation for being so tired when it was only the beginning of the week. Her mother was shutting her out, literally and emotionally; she didn't know why. She was over-eating to fill an emotional void; wasting time filing and organizing to not have to deal with the fact that her friends had filtered away and her boyfriend was mostly through a phone line. She felt herself disintegrating into school-work and too many hours of self psycho-analysis. "I like that you're so self-aware."It was a mixed blessing.

She wants every inch of him there with her. There is purpose. They will read plays together and speak foreign languages. He will teach her how to cook. She will teach him how to whistle. In the summer they will play in the sand. In the winter they will dance in the snow. She maintains an element of fantasy within her reality. It keeps things interesting. It keeps her going. This is unparalleled. It's a comical, awkward rendezvous paired with the purest love she's ever known. There are no footprints to walk upon but somehow they know where they're going.

Technology is the funniest thing. If you can push things and change colors or lights or sounds we're entranced. I finally fell into Firefox Mozilla and upgraded my phone from the old brick to a new lightweight gem with a camera and internet. Who needs such things?! It's these new grads making eighty grand a year that they write articles about in the paper. Do people read the newspaper? Generation Gadgit! We've got earbuds coming out of our head connecting us to 60 gigs of music or the hundreds of people in our phonebooks, talk about a crown of thorns!

The world is too warm. Her heart is too full. The stakes are too high. Nothing is dull. There's too much caffeine. It's going too fast. His list is too long. Nothing will last. The minds are too strong. Technology too freeing. Technology is binding. They know what we're seeing. In fall it's too hot. In winter it's fall. Spring brings us snowstorms. Summer, an imbalanced call. Her days are too organized. The laughter is low. So are the whispers. They're not for show. Her mind is too active. Their pulses too quick. Their adoration is growing. Worries, though, stick.

It's hardest for her in this environment. The constant talk of death, it's feel still hangs in the air. The loud voices of family rush through her, make her fear for her future, refreshing her past. Her first inclination is to shut out the world. The room is dusty with neglect. Pages of her past all left for dead when she pulled herself out of the coastline rut and moved north. This collaboration of words and placement is weakening. Her head is groggy wanting a good night's sleep in the bed of her grandmother's death where her love last slept.

The dogs are milling around looking for food that had dropped to the floor. Out of the large window that spanned the top half of the back wall you could see the swans sitting on the lake out back smiling at eachother. It's raining agressively and her father is complaining about a broken toe. Jon has to go buy brownie mix for the church picnic he's having tomorrow after the 11 o'clock service. It is a quiet night of board games or movies. Which is comforting, since this morning her father was telling her how his will is broken down.

I'm a day late sitting at a desk I'm 5 years in the making of making use of. These walls are comforting. But when finally they are is when I think about moving. To other walls? Other states? Why leave when one state finally feels stable enough to stay in? I'm reeling. A six month bender of good living leaves me breathless and worried about the day I step back off the edge where I came from. The pit of self-destruction I called home for those sordid years before. I'm going back to the scene of the crime? I'm going?

What is the thought process that leads up to laying down in that same chalk outline as if doing so will unmark the line and revive the body of the past? I'm too far gone. The caution tape isn't even up anymore. The guards are gone and I am free to traipse around the scene I sullied as if never considered a villain to myself in the first place. I am ill-tempered without my post-traumatic prescription for temperament. I sit. There's no need to worry about it now. Because the walls aren't moving themselves. Just my mind moves the scene.

She said, "I never want fall again!"Then why is she popping pills and feeling low? Why is she comparing and contrasting accomplishment and woes? Why does she only see the downfall instead of continuing to climb? Her new contacts came in but she'd rather just be blind. She said, "I've changed, and admittedly it's difficult."So she's trying not to slip. Why does she still sit around her piles, instead of cleaning up her shit? Just because she knows the steps doesn't mean she wants to dance. Why does she envision a year if she'll never take the chance?

"This is where Sarah and I used to go," she said as they got out of his car and stepped onto the gravel. What was this place? It was two docks behind an avenue of factories that sat on a body of water lined with skyscrapers. A boating nook among New Jersey industry. They sat on a picnic table and realized it was far too cold for May. Her semester was winding down, his adulthood was starting up. They both weren't sure. She thought she might tell him she loved him. Instead, he blurts out, "You give me anxiety."

Eddie and Billy were sitting across the room. Eddie was talking about our pal who cheated like a grade school tattle-tale. Each word he was using to put bricks on his pedestal while takin' ‘em right out from under our pal's feet. And the poor guy wasn't even there to defend himself. He'd never show up. Why sentence yourself to prison if the judge let you off, cuz he don't know. He doesn't know Pal ended up in the hospital with pancreatitis. Pal's only screwin' himself, then again, Eddie is too.. So much for messages of strength, hope, and courage.

"I don't like you anymore." "Why not?" "I dunno. Because you get to do things I wanna do... you get to have fun and I don't... I'm stuck in an office everyday and your life is a party... sleeping on couches, doing shots at work, and waking up at 6am to traipse off to Pete Seiger's house." "What am I supposed to do sit in a room and wait until you're available?" "No, you're supposed to make my life wildly exciting so I don't feel bad when you're going out and I, in reality, am sitting in my room."