Memories That Survive

Written many years ago. I've often tried to not explain this piece being that it's fairly obvious.

A fateful day would be too dramatic. 

It was more or less an ordinary day, as they always are it seems. It rained in the morning, I remember that well. I got splotches of mud against my crisp, white pants. I think I smiled or maybe I didn't that day. My brain forced my heart to forget certain things, but just because you can't see clearly through a window it doesn't mean you're blind. 

But sometimes, I wish I was. 

Hours later, there I was. Naked for you. I can't remember why, but there had to be a good reason, there's just no other way it would happen. I wondered what would happen if the priest next door would have seen through your blinds to the living room.  

Again, not blind. 

Your touch was like a barrel of a gun; cold, menacing . . . deadly. To say I was shot through the heart by your bullet of molested trust is an understatement. I was utterly decimated when your hand left my chest. It travelled down my stomach like a hungry spider as it crept lower and lower until— 

The tears came.  

Like the window previously mentioned, my rebellious eyes tried to fight away the image, the touch . . . the smell. It stank of shame mixed with absolute guilt. I know my soul was condemned to Hell the day I stepped into your car. The brown muddy specks on my pants told me that. 

But it didn't end there. 

"It's our secret," you whispered as I peered at the priest's house. I wanted faith to save me but does faith work like that? One can't ever be truly sure. My eyes were still blinded by the tears in my heart as I nodded my head. That wasn't the only movement. A soft bobbing ebbed from your arm and I knew what you were doing. I felt so exposed to you and you smiled . . . you smiled at a child. 

But was I? I was old enough to know better. 

Or so I thought, but nevertheless, I scampered to my room and cried against the door. I've never cried tears that silently before. It was as if a cougar had torn out my throat and lecherously watched me as I cleaned up the blood it made. Speechless horror, really. But still, that's dramatic. 

This isn't supposed to happen to boys—to anyone. I remember later, I crept out of the house and stared at the street of roaring cars. I contemplated throwing myself in front of any speeding vehicle just to make the damn tears stop. I'd rather be a oily blob of flesh against the asphalt than a broken human. Only, thoughts like that made the tears come faster. It was like my eyes ruptured and they wouldn't fix themselves. 

But they did fix themselves. 

As did I. Time went on and I remember hearing about your illness. I remember seeing you before you died. In a bed with no idea as to where you really were. Time had made your sanity plead guilty to all sorts of suspect mental disorders. 

Now, you're dead and I'm still alive. To me, you are a buried memory and someday you will leave my mind. But your stench will never leave my body. Your fingers traced numbers across my thighs and I still carry the ghostly scars across my skin. I still can't be in a relationship without crying over the mere mention of touch.  I remember the way you made me feel. 

Memories that wither and die only to become one with the void of lost space are nothing compared to the memories that survive.