stay warm
I fell deep inside my own head while I laid there mulling and watching and laughing and wondering. I think I started dreaming. I know I did, because I had rolled over onto my back, and I thought I felt someone touch my stomach. Obviously no one had touched me. I turned off the television with an icy pain in my chest and decided to heat it up with a cigarette. Then I checked my email.
"Stay warm" he said. It's the first email he's sent me in two and a half months and he listed three songs and said "keep warm." I didn't spit at the screen, or throw my hands in exasperation that this was all I got. Contrarywise, I surged with warmth. It was like those two words produced their own desired effect. "Stay warm," probably just meant "wear your coat" to him because he's a boy and boys don't think "what two words could I say that would encode the most comfort for her?" Men aren't mind readers. He had no idea that I made his phone ring immediately thereafter while whispering "thankyou" against the mouthpiece of mine. He was alseep. Now, I'm going to listen to the songs he sent me the names of, and I'm going to read meaning in their lyrics, even though he naturally had no such intention. Like when he says, "here's a song for you," and strums
"let's take our time and try to imagine, you and me, me and you, yeah."
He only played it because I love the band, lyrics were incidental. He has no intentions for loving me, or else he would say he loves me. Why, men, must you be men (though I wouldn't want you otherwise), and why must I dream like a woman?
I fell asleep in warmth, and I slept dreamlessly.
