I know and that is, I have too much to hold on to so I cannot truly be a monster.
This, I sometimes question. Especially on the days my walls get so thin.
But, just in case.
Be wary.
Still.
No.
Do not worry, I will never find you. You are safe. You should be glad all of my truck tires are balding, thin, and lacking responsibility. All of my trucks cannot bring me to you, and I have thousands. They thwart because they know. They have a handful of regular passengers and like a loyal soldier or loyal soldiers plural they stand, arms crossed, guns solid in their fists of stone and duty. None will look me in the eye, which is fine because I am too shamed I cannot look either. They know and they hold fast. I step forward, walk away, step forward, walk away. I know the trucks are filled with gas and I know their benches are worn with springs just beginning to poke through because each one of them holds the knowledge of the curve of my ass. I dream of breaking their ranks under the protection of night, rolling the bravest one back in silence. In the dream my heart beats with the force of a criminal with the crime being one against myself, and three more, but I push it down. Like how I always do. With you. In the dream I drive with my high beams on, the truck swerving unexpectedly. Its soldier’s heart full of its duty, but compassionate, it rights itself and keeps me straight. I picked the truest. The bravest. He tilts the rearview mirror when I am lost in the road. When I look into it, there is the car seat and my hand tilts the mirror back to the road that grows long behind me. The AM radio tells me the stories we like. Stories of spaceships, precognition, dark matter, tunnels of white light, shadow people, and Chupacabra. I memorize it all until dawn. I will be able to tell you how I believe in those things too. I see myself with you, nodding in enthusiastic conversation. I will not picture you naked even though I need to stay awake; there are so many hours left. My soldier truck companion will keep me safe despite his shaking head disappointment. The sun comes up and shines into my face, my head held high. I am driving straight into it because that is the direction where you are. I blind myself for you. My hands are frozen in a grip meant for better choices. I cannot feel my forearms but I keep driving.
Do not worry, I will never find you. You will be safe. You know I am a coward. You know about my anchors. I did not Google Earth you. I did not look at the front of your apartment building, and therefore do not know it has red brick stones and a blanket of ivy down the right hand side. I did not wonder if that was your car at the curb. I did not stare at the walkway that veers like a stretched comma through a lawn that is obviously meticulously cared for. I did not evaluate the income bracket that it might require in order to live there. I did not think about how you, with your legs strong with boots and its pants maybe jeans maybe shorts on a warm day, and a careless T-shirt so lucky against your torso, with your arms, all of your breathing and being and space you take up without me, walking down that comma, going places in you day to day that I don’t know about, that you never really tell me but that I think of. I did not become jealous of your neighbors, how they ask you how you are every day and how they can just ask you that using any number of words that they want and how they can just look into your eyes and how you can smile at them if you want and how they can just receive that smile and not think anything about that, how they would not lay awake at night replaying that smile in their heads while settling in for sleep, shitting in the face of such a wonderful gift. I do not want to bind and gag your neighbors for this insolence, this rudeness, this chutzpah, this disrespect impudence audacity all synonyms for not valuing that gift and stuffing them into a meat freezer in a basement
This, I sometimes question. Especially on the days my walls get so thin.
But, just in case.
Be wary.
Still.
No.
Do not worry, I will never find you. You are safe. You should be glad all of my truck tires are balding, thin, and lacking responsibility. All of my trucks cannot bring me to you, and I have thousands. They thwart because they know. They have a handful of regular passengers and like a loyal soldier or loyal soldiers plural they stand, arms crossed, guns solid in their fists of stone and duty. None will look me in the eye, which is fine because I am too shamed I cannot look either. They know and they hold fast. I step forward, walk away, step forward, walk away. I know the trucks are filled with gas and I know their benches are worn with springs just beginning to poke through because each one of them holds the knowledge of the curve of my ass. I dream of breaking their ranks under the protection of night, rolling the bravest one back in silence. In the dream my heart beats with the force of a criminal with the crime being one against myself, and three more, but I push it down. Like how I always do. With you. In the dream I drive with my high beams on, the truck swerving unexpectedly. Its soldier’s heart full of its duty, but compassionate, it rights itself and keeps me straight. I picked the truest. The bravest. He tilts the rearview mirror when I am lost in the road. When I look into it, there is the car seat and my hand tilts the mirror back to the road that grows long behind me. The AM radio tells me the stories we like. Stories of spaceships, precognition, dark matter, tunnels of white light, shadow people, and Chupacabra. I memorize it all until dawn. I will be able to tell you how I believe in those things too. I see myself with you, nodding in enthusiastic conversation. I will not picture you naked even though I need to stay awake; there are so many hours left. My soldier truck companion will keep me safe despite his shaking head disappointment. The sun comes up and shines into my face, my head held high. I am driving straight into it because that is the direction where you are. I blind myself for you. My hands are frozen in a grip meant for better choices. I cannot feel my forearms but I keep driving.
Do not worry, I will never find you. You will be safe. You know I am a coward. You know about my anchors. I did not Google Earth you. I did not look at the front of your apartment building, and therefore do not know it has red brick stones and a blanket of ivy down the right hand side. I did not wonder if that was your car at the curb. I did not stare at the walkway that veers like a stretched comma through a lawn that is obviously meticulously cared for. I did not evaluate the income bracket that it might require in order to live there. I did not think about how you, with your legs strong with boots and its pants maybe jeans maybe shorts on a warm day, and a careless T-shirt so lucky against your torso, with your arms, all of your breathing and being and space you take up without me, walking down that comma, going places in you day to day that I don’t know about, that you never really tell me but that I think of. I did not become jealous of your neighbors, how they ask you how you are every day and how they can just ask you that using any number of words that they want and how they can just look into your eyes and how you can smile at them if you want and how they can just receive that smile and not think anything about that, how they would not lay awake at night replaying that smile in their heads while settling in for sleep, shitting in the face of such a wonderful gift. I do not want to bind and gag your neighbors for this insolence, this rudeness, this chutzpah, this disrespect impudence audacity all synonyms for not valuing that gift and stuffing them into a meat freezer in a basement
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