I’m From Kilgore, TX.

by Johnny

Satellite overhead image of Texas from Google Earth 2022

I’m fifteen. I’ve lost everything. I’m broken and alone. You came into my life, and destroyed all the soul left in me, but I have to fight. I have to win you back, and if I don’t…well…I can’t think about that. I don’t think about that, because if I do, I’m afraid of what will happen.

December
Every song is you. Every word that comes out of every mouth is yours. The letters on this page seem to only spell out your name. All of my friends have to censor what they say because they know the wrong word will set me off. I’m a bomb waiting for something to remind me of your touch, your smell, your sound. You’ll come back though, I know it. You’ll tell me that you love me and can’t live without me. You have to…

January
I cannot think of any face but yours. It’s not like I’d want to. I’m in love with you. I know it for sure now, I’ll let you slip into me one more time. I can go back to the torturous place in my mind where all memories of you are stored. This is the only place I can finally feel at home. Becoming undead doesn’t hurt too bad. Not speaking, not responding, just thinking. Thinking of how perfectly our hands fit together, or how at one time, you wanted me even more than I wanted you. There has to be something. Something I can do to make you see that I’m more than this pathetic person. I still have hope you just need more time.

February
These razors don’t hurt so bad either, and holding on to your memory is more important than anything right now. I can’t just allow myself to forget the sound of your voice, or the warmth of your embrace, and looking at these cuts help me remember that you used to think of me. I wasn’t just your experiment, I was a possibility of love. You’re all that matters to me. I’ll never love anyone as much as you.

April
He means nothing to me. He made me forget you for just a little while. I felt like myself again. I wasn’t sad. I wasn’t a zombie, but then you walked past me in the hall and I fell. I fell back into the “real world” and I remembered that I was still only half of a human. You took my heart, how did I expect to give anyone else something that was in your possession. The fall is faster than I remembered.

June
Happy Birthday to me. I keep expecting you to show up, but that won’t happen. Whoever is in charge has decided that happiness should be an impossible goal.

July
Not seeing you is proving to be both beneficial and detrimental. You’re not my every thought… I’m not sure whether it’s good or bad.

September
Knowing that after this year you will be gone and most likely never talk to me again, but I’ve built up a resistance. You can only hurt me in small doses, but the pain still seeps through. I still can’t forget. I still wake up and have you as the only thing I want, but I’m “moving on”…whatever that means.

October
I did it. I told you everything, or I think I did. I don’t really remember considering I was intoxicated. I didn’t really mean to drink. It’s just that I knew you were, so I felt like I had to. That’s not really the way I wanted it to sound, but it’s out there and now there’s nothing I can do about it. It’s in your hands now.

November
You’ve decided to never be in my presence again. I can’t do this. Falling begins again.

December
You sent me a message telling me that you wanted to talk to me about Halloween.

I am sixteen. My hopes are not getting up, but everything is progress, right? I had to have hit bottom, things are supposed to go up. This might never work out. I know I’m just a teenager in love, but there has to be more to this than just hormones. I believe in this, and hopefully some day you will too.

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