Originally written 25/6/26, updated 20/7/26
Life with you is a mechanical dance.
I step, you step, I try to copy.
You tell me I stepped on your foot and I apologise. I move my foot away so it doesn’t happen again.
I step, you step, I try to copy.
You tell me I stepped wrong again, but I thought I did the exact opposite. I still apologise, I still move my feet away, I still try to prevent it from happening.
I step but I’m scared, you have to step further than usual because of it, I try to make up for it.
You ask me what’s wrong, but I don’t trust you inside my chest cavity. You tell me that in order to make this dance work you must know what’s inside me, and honestly you’re right. I try to open my chest cavity for you.
I step, my cavity being open screws up my balance, I stumble.
You tell me it hurts your hands when I stumble like that, but you were the one who wanted my cavity open. Nevertheless, I want you to stop hurting, so I close my cavity again. I can’t seem to stop stepping on your feet.
I step, you step, I try to copy.
You tell me that now your hands hurt and you must know what’s inside my cavity. But I can’t do both, that isn’t possible. Yet, still, I must try, because I truly am difficult sometimes. I do keep stepping on your feet, after all. I rebalance myself and hide everything out of reflex. The effort dislocates my ankles.
I’m too scared to step, you notice, you’re upset now because our gears aren’t turning right.
I apologise and try to explain myself, and you try to listen to me, you really do, but you only hear what you need to hear. I don't pay any mind to your response because I'm too busy balancing on my dislocated ankles.
I step, you step, I try so, so hard to copy.
You lash out. You break down. You beg me. You accuse me. You block me out. I lash out too, because what the hell, I’m tired and it hurts, but I’m so swiftly guilty that I weld you back together without thinking of own wounds for a moment. We try to resolve things, but I'm so tired, it doesn’t matter, this is a mechanical dance, everything I say is hollow to you anyway. You tell me this thinking will ruin the dance. I secretly think that if I give it up, that is what will end it.
I step, you step, I just blindly step and hope it’s right.
It’s wrong. You lash out again. You bring up the time I lashed out. You bring up the fact that I didn’t trust you with the inside of my cavity. You bring up all the times I’ve stepped on your feet. I just take it, dissociate and fake-peace my way out of the conflict. My part in the dance never mattered anyway, my ankles have been dislocated for months, I only ever think about my own clockwork when it starts to make me collapse unacceptably. Why speak up when all I seem capable of doing is making you hate me.
I step blindly, I brace, I step again and pray it isn’t bad enough to justify another fight.
It’s wrong. It’s wrong. It’s always wrong. You tell me that, no matter how much I improve, the bad will always outweigh the good. You’ve started reading into every tiny thing I do for signs of imperfection to justify all of this. I’m beginning to wonder if the only reason our gears ever turned was because I had been so willing to dislocate my ankles for you.
I close my eyes, I step, I step, I step.
You’re saying something about wiring and safety that I can’t even hear anymore. Your pain has spread from your hands to your wrists, up your forearms and into your elbows. I just step and hope and step and hope because there’s nothing I can do. Words mean nothing, gestures mean nothing, I mean nothing. You said the first two. I know you think the last one. I know I’m not helping, but I really don’t care anymore.
I step, I step, I step, I step, I step.
You lash out one final time and my ankle snaps in half. The pressure severed the titanium joint. I want to scream at you in agony. Get the fuck away from me. Leave me the fuck alone. What the fuck are you doing to me. I force it into agonised politeness instead because you still hate me for last time and god knows I can’t take one more fight. You tell me it's my fault for stepping in ways I've never stepped, but surely you wouldn't lie to me. Surely I'm the one who's been stepping wrong this whole time. Surely.
I can’t step anymore. I can’t, I can’t, I can’t, I can’t.
I know I’m at least half the problem, though you say I’m more so I must be more. I can’t judge how much I’m hurting you nor whether I’m a good person. I shouldn’t judge that. I must be terrible. You say I am. You’ve always believed I am. And it’s not like I ever thought to stop stepping or give up the dance, even when it was clearly going terribly. I’m not blameless. You said it yourself, it takes two to dance. I must be awful. I must be.
Stepping is an invitation to be broken. Dancing is just asking to be hurt. I was stupid to even try. I should’ve known better.
But does it really matter if I am awful? My ankle is a mess of twisted metal that hurts like fuck. Every time I step near someone I robotically rattle off a hundred clarifications and apologies. Every time I so much as think about clockwork I’m bracing everything in me for the inevitable consequences. My friends and family have been noticing the terror in my every step for months now. Everyone keeps asking me if I’m okay and I keep hiding how much this dance has been breaking me. But should I? Would it truly be so unjust of me to say something?
I drag myself to my feet. I step. The broken titanium stabs into the ground like the dagger of Brutus.
I really can’t bring myself to spend any more energy on our dance. It is over. It should’ve been over a long time ago. I finally start welding my ankle back together. My wrist is kind of broken too, actually. And the bend in my foot. And the way the right side of my jaw attaches to my head. The pain in my ankles eclipsed so much other damage.
I take an experimental step on my new ankle because I can’t reach the soldering iron without standing up.
I end up spending way more time than I intended fixing myself. My motherboard had somehow gotten fried long ago. My PSU had water damage. The majority of my cogs were misshapen. I’d been going about all my previous dances with so much broken inside me. No wonder I was so willing to let you break me again. No wonder my steps were so wrong.
I can walk much more normally now. Not dance, of course, just walk. These things take time, and I am in no rush. I hope, one day, I can find someone who's patient with my many flaws. My brokenness. The way I step. Maybe then I could dance again. But, for now, I’m just glad I’m not breaking myself anymore.
