She only kissed me when she cried. She would come in through the bathroom window, taking care not to smash any of the glass bottles my mother had set on top of the toilet for decoration. I would hold her as she sobbed and pat her hair and tell her that she was beautiful because she was—she is. And then she would look up and she would kiss me. She always tasted like salt and the smell of autumn rainstorms and something like love. I would pull her closer and she would push me backwards onto the bed because the only way she knew how to get close was to push away. Somehow our clothes would end up on the floor and she'd be naked and pale and her tears were gone but I could still taste them on her skin and that somehow made me need her more. I would kiss every part of her and taste Heaven on her, and I loved her—I love her—so much that sometimes I thought and knew that I would die if it meant that I could never see her again. I know now that I'll never get the taste of her off the back of my throat. I wouldn't give that taste up for the world. We would fall asleep together every time. And every time, when I woke up alone, I thought that I couldn't be emptier.
I'd loved her since she was six and I was four. She'd gotten up in front of the class and said "My name is Thalia. I only eat blue candy." Then, just like that, she sat back down again. And that's when I knew I loved her.
I was there through her first failed relationship. His name was Luke. I hated him. They'd been dating for five months when she came to my window the first time.
"Let me in," She had said, tears running down her face. "Let me in."
And I had. And I had held her. And she had kissed me.
"Luke?" I'd whispered against her lips.
"I want to give my everything to someone who will keep it," She'd whispered back before connecting her heroin lips with the skin of my neck.
I still remember her face. I still remember her. Her and Luke broke up the next week. He was with someone else the next day.
She'd started dating another guy after that, Apollo. I hated him. She took him to prom. I didn't go. She'd come to me later that night, still in her prom dress with a tiara perched on her raven-dark hair and tears running her mascara down her face. I helped her up so she didn't tear her dress and then I'd held her like I knew I should. She said something about Apollo and a hand somewhere that she didn't want it and then she'd cried harder as I plotted ways to make him pay. And then I'd kissed her softly and tried to put everything that I had into it so that she would know that I cared about her more than anyone she'd ever know. And she'd stopped crying. And I told her that I loved her. And she'd started crying again. But then she'd said something that might have been an "I love you, too" and I kissed her again, tasting tears on her tongue that may or may not have been for me. She was gone again the next morning, but she had left her tiara on my nightstand. I loved her. I love her. I love her.
We'd gone to college like we were supposed to, her to the south and me to the north. I missed her and I wrote to her, but it wasn't the same. When it was quiet at night except for the breathing of my roommate, I could still hear her moans in my ear and feel her skin under my fingertips. One month passed, then two, then four, and I was back home with colored strings lighting up the snow beneath my feet. She came on the first night. When we had finished I had begged her not to leave.
"Stay with me. Stay tonight. Please."
And she'd smiled sadly and told me no. No because she loved me too much. And I'd started crying then. I told her that I loved her and that I wanted her to stay with me forever because it hurt too much to be without her, but she had still said no. She'd said no. And it hurt—God, did it hurt—but I let her go because she wanted me to. The feel of her was burned into my flesh. I'd forgotten how well we fit together. I didn't see her for a while after that. Three weeks with nothing but her memory to run on. But then she'd come back, the night before I left. She told me that she loved me and that she wanted to be mine, she just didn't know how. And we'd fallen asleep with all our clothes on, and she was there in the morning. She was still there.
Summer came and she agreed to be mine. And she was. And we were happy. So fucking happy. We nearly got dizzy from it all, but we'd just laugh it off and keep on going. We made promises that I somehow knew she wouldn't keep and she'd tell me things she somehow knew I would believe despite everything. College came around again and she was gone, too far for me to reach. And then I'd lost her…I'd lost her again. And I'd cried. I'd cried a lot. But she was gone, and I couldn't get her back because I was too fucking far away.
She hadn't come to me for Christmas. I didn't even know if she was in town. And it hurt. It hurt so much I thought it would kill me from the inside and out. This rotting disease called love was shredding my veins and I just wanted to get rid of it, but the thing had claws that wouldn't let me go. I tried to forget. I failed horribly. In trying to forget it made me remember more. Worst of all, it made me realize that I'd never really known her like I wanted to, if only because she wouldn't let me.
I've found her now, though. She works down the street in the café on the corner. I haven't seen her in two years. Two miserable fucking years. But now I can talk to her, and I can tell her at least once more that I love her, and I can ask her to please, please, please stay with me. Because I've found out in these two years that I need her. That I need her to be happy and that I want to make her happy, and that I think I'm the only one that can make her happy because she always came to me when she was sad. So there's my story. There's my plea. Now wish me luck. Good-bye.