I don't normally drink socially, but I like to pretend that makes me a worse person

I'm sitting in a chair

The dusk slumbers on outside

A bead of sweat slips down my back

And nestled somewhere between my ass and the chair.

My eyes are resolute. 

Stare ahead. Blink every six seconds

So the iron contacts don't crack

My corneas in half, like a cuckoo

Drinking egg yolk.

Sound

My head swivels automatically.

Bile and humor war in my throat,

Where stories and panic jumble together

In the cradle of my heart.

I can feel it dancing

Blood swimming in and out

Blood membrane in my skull

Filtering endorphins 

To their tiny little receptor homes.

Back ahead.

I swallow the joke I'm lying about.

It tastes like missed opportunities 

Refuse to allow myself to look

When her voice crawls in my ear

And gnaws at the tiny bones inside.

I'm asked a question I don't know the answer to and bluff my ignorance into a response.

I will not look. 

I will not look. 

The lights flicker. 

Surely in the dark, it's okay?

I will not look.

I look, and the air solidifies in my lungs.

Heat betrays my cheek

And I hastily scramble to bury myself in pretending again.

For a moment, I am strong. 

For a moment, I see shaking fingers hidden behind practiced confidence.

For a moment, I do not hate myself.

And then 29 years of revulsion, cruelty, and loathing collide like a semi truck in snow.

I am not a person

I am not a man

And I can not forgive myself, nor allow the iceberg of my life to drift into her Titanic. 

I will not look again. 

I will not let myself fall in infatuation

I do not love.

I am weak, and she is strength.

So why does it hurt to hope?