take your time

it starts with a laugh and ends with me on my back, sobbing on my bedroom floor. Let it pour out. Were there even any tears? I touched the place on my sternum that used to ache. It hurts when I press on it and I remember the time you bruised my ribcage by rubbing the wrong place. I didn't want to draw your attention to it because I didn't want you to stop talking.
So baby, take your time with this thing you have. I am so bad at patience but I can't rush you. I can't even try. I imagine a broken heart with big black stitches. Yarn keeping all the pieces together. I imagine sending this to you with a note inside that says, "take your time."
I miss you so much, I miss you and I say it to my empty room. I miss you and I say it outloud to wake myself up but it turns out I'm not dreaming.
I wish for things that I cannot have. I wish for you and I keep my fingers still. I wish for you and do nothing.
What else can I do?
I daydream letters that I neither send nor write. I daydream bike rides we do not take. I daydream conversations we'll never have. I daydream a life where we are together and then I think of something else. That's how it always ends; a change of conversation. Make my train of thought switch tracks.
There is nothing to go back to, right? Was it all in my head?
What would I have had to look forward to with you? All I see is potential. All I ever saw was what could be there. All I saw was an end to your self-imposed suffering. I wonder if you even realize all the people that would gladly carry you on their shoulders if you would just let them? Once I was your crutch but you quickly pushed me aside in favor of a poorly-healed bone. Once I was your crutch but you turned me into kindling once you saw what was happening.
I can't predict you.
So I just stay away.
You knew this would happen. But you pushed forward anyway. We both knew better. We knew and ignored it and I miss being around your goddamn stillness with the writhing monsters under your skin. I miss being around your fucking cold eyes. I miss you looking through me at things no one else can see. I miss hearing you speak. I miss your voice. I miss your jerky movements and your songs. I miss your fucking knotted shoelaces. I miss untying them. I loved untying them. I loved you.
How many more times can I change before I get to where I'm going? Where am I going? Where are you?
Am I ever gonna see you again on purpose?
Are you gonna turn that lie into a truth? The one you prefaced with, "I wouldn't say it if it wasn't going to happen;" the one where you said you would see me again?
Don't think about me anymore.
I can't stand all this radio static.