To the Girl who set me on fire: An excerpt

She touched the palm of my hand leisurely, but it was enough to make my ears thrum and mind derail itself. Unreasonably unsteady; my feet, my consciousness. The gravity beneath me constricting and closing in, her fist the sole reason. She barely touched me; she didn’t have to do a single thing to cause this heightening of everything I am. But yet she did. Wrapped her lithe fingers around my quivering skin so casually that I felt, despite the chaos it was creating inside of me, that it was the most natural thing in the entire universe. I was sick to the core, spring blooming around my insides as she coaxed the hidden thoughts from within me out into the open.

Every breath is a mouthful, every exhale a chore. I could easily have submerged myself in the dangerous feeling - the crisp air clogging my senses, numbing my ability to comprehend life. Who I was, what was expected of me, that of which was considered right and wrong was doused in flame and I reveled in the smoke.

Skin utterly bruising under the new strain, the sheer warmth filtering across hollowed cheeks despite the cold atmosphere. Whispers of comfort, boots crunching heavily upon concrete, loose stones lodging between the gaps in the sole. Mist obscuring our faces, yet we could feel the heat pouring out of one another’s bodies and eloping the other; as if some unforeseen force was seizing us back into position. Guiding us as rain started to descend from darkened skies. As we walked, side by side, unintentionally matching pace, stride in stride. I imagine I would easily die for this to be my everyday, if the opportunity was ever laid before my awestruck eyes. Turn the blade upon myself to feel an ounce of this perfection again and be able to call it my own; for it to be my normal. For her to be my own, for her to be my normal.

I’ve never felt comfortable in my own skin. The shell it produces around my bones is too loose or too tight for me to move freely. This anxiety that never seizes, that stirs in my gut and rapts with pointed fingernails against my veins; from the inside out. It never slows. Yet when she’s in the room I feel compelled to believe that I’m not only fine, but extraordinary, and striking, in every single way of which I know ordinarily that I could never be. Hope sprung from this hopelessness, she reflects all that I see as beauty and turns it, like a raging tide that is too beautiful to shy away from, back unto me. I could give her a mirror and she would flip it back around, and tell me that I am the world; and yet I still feel unworthy when we steal sweet, forbidden glances in the dark. Eyes that shine despite no sun, a light that leaves her flesh regardless of time and season.

Ever since I was a child, I have believed in fae, and merfolk. Gorged on twisted tales by lamplight of witches and wizards and ghosts. Never have I been more convinced than now, in this singular, chaotic moment of absolute sublimity, that they walk among us, humanity. Charming us with little speech but emotions aplenty as we willingly fork over our souls. When she smiles at me, with soft curves and lifted cheeks, pinks and peaches and eyes that never gloss over in boredom, I want to ruin myself for the weakness of my past self. Those plentiful times of which I almost didn’t allow myself to make it this far. Festering notions of self sabotage my own villain; homemade obstacles.

I want these consequences. Any and all if she will let me.