My teeth don't sit right in my jaw if I hold it open long enough, so I clench down as hard as I can, hoping that the feeling of oral normality will return soon, even though I know it'll take a good ten minutes. This is secondary though. Just a fleeting thought. What I'm really focused on is the rise and fall of the chest pressed against me.
We're both totally lost. There are regular breakdowns in our circles. Nothing that solicits more than a hard drink or a quick slash to the arm, but enough to totally ruin a good night. The pressures of a thousand things bear down on us, and eventually, we just snap.
I'm trying my hardest to breathe inversely to her. Whenever her chest and stomach rise, mine contract, and vise versa. It makes for some interesting breathing patterns, and if I'm not ready, I'll end up out of breath. This doesn't make any difference though. For all we care, we could be cold and gone in our graves. Oblivion surrounds us in a warm blackness.
A lot of people would label our problems whiny and bitchy, but they are our problems, so they're paramount to us. We talk for hours, stroking each other's egos whenever we're on the brink, or whatever we think is the brink. Life will probably prove us to be whiny and bitchy, but that's for later.
Our arms intertwine around each other in intersecting appendicular comfort cocoons. I can feel every detail of her torso pressed against mine and I can feel a warm breath against my neck. Our chins dug into each other's shoulders, I sense a tear that runs down the side of her face to the place where our cheeks meet, bonding us with a drop of saltwater.
So we lean on each other when leaning on other people, drinks, cuts and pills aren't enough. When we can't even find solace in sleep, we find solace in each other. It's not really an Eros, Agape, or any other definable love. It's a love based on dependence on another along with denial of everything else.
And so we're together, attempting to reach a Nirvana-like state of nothingness where any attempt to describe the vast abyss is putting too much of a tangibility to it. There we stand, on the driveway, eyes tight shut, grappling each other in a motionless fight to beat down everything inside us.
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