#mlm prose

Promise you won’t break me?

Promise you’ll be gentle with me?

I’m frail and easy to scare and hurt.

You have called me your deer for a reason I fear.

But please understand, I’m trusting you already so much more than I think you realize.

My fear and anxiety come from needing you more than I need air.

Every move and thought is centered around what it would feel like to lose you.

And sometimes it consumes me, a loss that hasn’t happened yet sinks its way into my soul, and I feel like the air is being taken from my lungs.

Please be gentle, please be honest, please be kind, please be mine.

I’ve told you before that I couldn’t recover from Us.

I don’t think I could.

I’d look at someone new and think of you.

My world has shifted and every first and last thought is you.

Your laugh, your voice, your hands, the things you love. The man that you are. The man that you see me as.

the second time, i was dead before you even arrived on the scene. all you knew was that this particular battlefield ran cold with unspoken sadness and broken promises.

the third, you called me “brother” and we fought and died for each other, far beyond the laws of men. (they say our bodies still rest, intertwined, beneath that rocky outcrop- frankly i’m inclined to agree)

the fourth life rolled around and i called you lover; your eyes lit up like i had never seen before. i knew in that moment that you must feel this too. unfortunately life is not kind to fools in love, and we did not make it an entire lifetime.

But I can’t stop when your laugh feels like the first day of sunshine on my skin after winter.

When your wit runs circles around mine and you make me laugh so often.

When the sincerity in your tone sends shivers down my spine.

How could I ever be a strong-willed man? When all it takes to bring me to my knees is your voice.

I’d follow you to my demise if you had the heart to do so.

My world shifted and you became the star I revolve around.

Your skin feels fuzzy and the world around you feels out of focus.

There’s a ringing in your ear, as hostile voices scream out through your head.

You don’t belong here, and this world isn’t for you. Every measure of trying just alienates you further.

Maybe there’s really nothing for you here. It can’t be that anyone would actually care for your absence; if they were to notice.

It’s hard not to feel like a fool and a plaything isn’t it?

When you’re told such sweet promises, just to be lied to without mercy.

When they tell you they love you, and then take it back. Either with their words or actions,

They take your fragile heart and soul, cradle it in their hands and whisper soft love and affection.

Just to crush it.

How many times is that your fate?

To be lied to over and over again.

To not be considered, when you consider so much.

To not be given the grace you so freely give out.

To be punished for your faith in the authenticity of others.

I certainly didn’t expect the weight of your fingers lifting at my heart to feel fluttery and warm.

Usually people try and be gentle but their nails are too long, and they puncture fragile veins. Or they forget their strength in such a vulnerable area.

But the softness you hold it with, makes the grass seem a little greener. Rainy days feel more comforting than sad.

I hope I’m as gentle with yours as you are with mine. I chide others for their lack of care but I’m prone to the same mistakes.

And if I were to puncture or forget my strength one too many times I’d understand your consistent hesitancy to give me back the key.

I’d give you mine again and again though.

One that feels all consuming and terrifying but electrifying all the same.

Where I feel insane and incapable of living a life without you.

Do you feel it too?

Every time I say ‘I love you’ does it warm your soul?

Does my presence feel like a home you’ve been missing since forever?

Does your heart ache when we’ve spent too long apart?

Does my laugh make you feel alive like yours does for me?

Or were you just the catalyst in me revisioning what I had thought I deserved.

A lonely and loveless life I had created in my head; became full of joy and promise overnight.

Maybe that’s where the uncertainty comes from.

Wanting you so deeply, wanting a life with you more than I have ever wanted anything.

I’m terrified of losing it. Losing you.

I know you have your ways, but can I whisper to you that silence really just reminds me of being ignored.

That without complete details and disclosure, I freeze.

Unable to navigate this dark messy labyrinth with no light source or guide. Being left in the dark has never done me good.

So perhaps that’s why I’m grasping so desperately for anything that gets me closer to clarity I crave.

Letting things be has never been a strong suit of mine, I need answers and results immediately, I’m impatient and anxious to a fault.

So, is this uncertainty due to you specifically, or is it due to my own wavering belief that I deserve so little, happiness shouldn’t be on the table for me.

Your presence in my life fills me with such hope that my anxiety cannot comprehend that I deserve someone who loves me like you say you do.

I was meant to be lonely. And you changed that.