Thoughts of Joel.
The alarm rings at 04:00 AM every day. Even on weekends, it rings. It’s the one constant in my life. It takes me back to a time in my life when in these early mornings I had to slowly maneuver out of the bed I shared with my two younger brothers. So peaceful they were, I often wondered what magnificent worlds their dreams had taken them to. Were they kings in some far away land? Or were they just dreaming about nothing and the calm that it brings?
The light slowly creeps into the bathroom through the window, it’s so familiar and I let it dance on my skin. The sensation reminds me of him, Joel. The boy I would stand with at the corner of Bra Willies shop as we shared a cigarette, and our skin would unintentionally touch. A brief moment of intimacy.
These random memories of Joel flood my mind from time to time, they kept at bay the memory of when I would stand in the kitchen with my school uniform on and the stench of alcohol mixed with a bit of sleep filling the air followed by words that would forever ring in my ears…
“Ya stabane”. How did she know?
Her violence knows no limits. I turned around to look at her and wondered where it went wrong. Was my mother always this hurtful? Did she ever love me? Because the hate I’m seeing in her eyes tells me otherwise.
I’ll always remember her beauty and past kindness though, I’ll always have those moments of her telling me she loved me. I may have been a child but I believed her.
Thoughts of my mother are never any good. They take me to a time in my life when all I ever got from her was disgust and alcohol fueled violence and my nails drawing blood from my palms because of how hard I had clenched my fists.
The lesson of control was one I learned in my teens. I wish I hadn’t because as I put on this black suit and get ready to say goodbye, oh Joel, I wish I could allow myself to breakdown for you. I stand here wishing this was not your end. This should have never been your end but I guess friends bury friends’ right?
I’m still here at this corner where we shared cigarettes, sometimes I think that our ghosts will meet to sit and gather in eternity.
I wish we’d never left Bra Willies shop — I can still feel your shoulder brush against mine as you try to stop me from beating your street fighter high score. And we’ve been brushing shoulders ever since. You’ve always been my best friend, oh lover, even when I told you that I met someone. Watched you pick up the pieces of your heart that shattered all over my student res floor.
You knew that she was just someone I’d eventually hurt, just a shield to protect me from all the stares and wondering whispers. You expected me to find myself and move away from the corner but I was scared and wanted to stay frozen in the moments where it was just you and I, in your room… just two boys intertwined and free in each other’s arms.
Joel, I’m still sixteen inside and wishing you were in front of me but you became a man, loved yourself… and me for a while.
I remember that Friday afternoon when you invited me over to your house, I don’t know if it was the weed or just us being young but I found safety in you, and the moment our lips touched I became more afraid than I’d ever been in my entire life… but I also never felt braver.
Joel what if I never left? I guess I’ll never know. I wonder what you thought of me in the end.
I’m still living my life in “what ifs” and to be honest I’m afraid I’ll never move past the delusions and the what ifs… what if I never move past you, what if the moment they say “rest in peace” forever haunts my dreams?
Hey Joel, you were right, I’m always going to be where you found me… only difference is that I’m older but I’m still hiding the real me. Forgive me for burying you in falseness when you lived in truth.
