• this is what id like to say • “this is what i’d like to say to this boy. i’m not gonna hide anything, he’s not gonna bother to come and see me tell you this anyway. when i met you, it was like the clouds in my head had separated and i could finally, finally, see light for once. there was no rain, no snow, no hail, there was just sunshine. i loved how your hair curled slightly behind your ears, how your shoulders shook when you laughed too hard, how when you smiled it curved at the edges just ever so slightly but if it was straight it would make such a huge difference. you asked me out one afternoon and i said yes. but i went home, and i called you telling you i’d go out with you. i called you two more times after that until i said it the way i wanted to remember it, and i told you i was sorry for calling so much because my obsessive compulsive disorder made me. and then you said it was okay. when you knocked on my door to pick me up, i was tying my shoes. so i opened it and went back to tying my shoes, but i untied them and retied them and undid them and redid them and undid them and redid them and undid them and redid them until i knew i wouldn’t have to stop our conversation so i could tie them and untie them and retie them and untie them and retie them. when you told me you loved me for the first time i told you i loved you back but i didn’t say it the right way. so i apologized and said it again and again and again, i love you too, i love you too, i love you too, i love you too, i love you too. you smiled and said it was okay, and that you loved how i kept telling you. you loved how i told you i loved you so many times, and how i kissed you so many times. you loved how i kept drawing and redrawing and redrawing and redrawing and redrawing and redrawing my contemporary art project, and you were so happy when i told you i got an ‘a+' on it. at my graduation, as student council they wanted me to say a speech but i couldn’t because i knew that i would say it over and over and over and over and over and over and over until i got it right, so you said you would read it for me. and it was perfect the very first time you did it. you asked me to move in with you, so i did. and you loved how i said goodnight 26 times, and how i got up to lock the door 13 times before finally going to bed. you said you loved how i would hold your hand as you wrapped your arms around me, and if i woke up and we weren’t in that position, i’d move us into that position. you told me you loved how when i made coffee in the morning it took me so long because it had to taste perfect but i knew i couldn’t do it over and over and over. you told me you loved me. you told me you loved me you loved me you loved me and i loved you back. rewind, last month you told me you loved me but you didn’t have that small sparkle in your voice when you said it. and i told you i loved you back and said it until it sounded like i meant it, but afterwards you didn’t smile. instead of waiting for me to make you coffee, you went to the coffee shop up the road and bought one, you bought one, you bought one, you bought one. and rewind, you didn’t come home last week. you came home three days ago at four thirty seven in the morning, and i know it was thirty seven seconds into the minute cause i didn’t sleep at all that week, counting and counting and counting and counting and counting until you came home. you called me crazy for staying up all night and now that you were home i could go to sleep. i didn’t. i waited and waited and waited and waited until you went to bed. you didn’t wrap your arms around me, or hold my hand, or tangle our legs together. you slept on the far right side of the bed and i slept on the left right side like i always did, but you weren’t there on the middle left side to hold me through the night. rewind, yesterday morning you told me that i needed to get you off my mind but i can’t i can't i can't i can't i can't i can't i can't and you don’t realize that i don’t get addicted to things like i got addicted to you. i didn’t get addicted to things until i met you. and now you’re gone. your antique copy of moby dick i bought for your 19th birthday is missing from my bookshelf with the movies on it, and i haven’t moved over the other DVDs cause thats not where they belong. you gave me a video tape of our first christmas together, and i watched it over and over and over and over last night. so now its just my graduation speech. and since last night ive watched it 16 times. you rang me this morning and told me you were coming over so you could pick up that tape, and i hung up to stop myself from saying i love you i love you i love you i love you. i left it on the cabinet next to the bookshelf with a cup of coffee just the way you like it, and my emily brontë novel because 2 years ago you said you'd read it if i sang to you that night and you forgot you forgot you forgot you forgot. i left the book next to the black tape and i’m wearing the crimson shirt you left me in, and the bed is left the way it was when you stopped sleeping next to me. i haven’t washed my hands after i touched someone since june 11th, 2012 when you told me you loved me. but today i washed my hands 19 times before touching this microphone because i can’t keep the touch of someone who’s not you on me.”