Butterfly Kiss

Unsure if I’m playing the fool or I actually am the fool, likely both, I decide it best to write what feels good to me instead of waiting around for anybody else to shove me over the edge into my own frightening abyss. The unfortunate side effect of which is that I write a lot, and I write often, and I do not check myself or my feelings at the door as perhaps would be the more sensible thing to do. But I’m so very tired of sensible. I’m so very sick to my stomach from reigning myself in all the time just to fit in in a place I didn’t sign up for but have nevertheless been forced to navigate as best I can divine. It feels lonely in the place where I live, the deep caged chasm in my chest, but there is something about it that I cling to with all my might. I couldn’t tell you why., I couldn’t tell you a lot of things though god knows I try. Taking a seat at the bar, I order a whiskey neat, something spicy warm and delicious from down south. Staring at the talking heads on the TV for a brief moment before turning my attention to the messages I mindlessly scroll through on my phone, I take a swallow and notice a guy coming in the side door. He is handsome in a rugged kind of way, but also has a certain boyish wide-eyed look to his chiseled face. Removing his hat, he shyly asks the bartender for a whiskey neat, twist, and she swivels her eager hips as she turns to fulfill his request. She is young, friendly in an aloof kind of way, and devastatingly gorgeous in her tights and tee shirt, knotted just above her navel, hugging the slimmest part of her toned waist. Hair and makeup all softness and gloss, I watch as her perfectly manicured fingers unscrew the top of the bottle, pour with precision, and screw the lid back on in a flash. If I were the hat guy, I would be imagining her naked, but perhaps that’s not for me to say. I tend to write other people’s stories for them when I should mind my own business. There are so many things you are not supposed to say, I’ve lost track of whether I should be keeping track. I know we wander the outside world all the while looking to just for one fleeting second come back home to ourselves, but give us a little flash of something raw and wrong along the way. Take that top off and blind the pain that eats at the back of my heart. Show me something I’ve been missing since the beginning of the ending of it all. Finishing my drink, I pay up and tip the bartender well. She’s good people and it’s a much tougher gig than most will give her credit for tonight, I’m sure of it. The evening welcomes me warmly as I light up a cigarette and exit out the side door the chiseled boy came in, and as I breathe in the early springtime air, everything is sweet and still. There is a pale buttery sun sinking low in a flossy pink cotton candy sky. There are buds on the branches of the tree which hangs low over my car, I notice their tight green nubs just barely visible as I open the door and climb in. It’s been a day and it’s only sunset. It’s been a week and it’s only Wednesday. It’s two months in but something fluttering inside me feels like today is the beginning of a new kind of year.