odessa

"so this is what makes you tick," she speaks with her head pointed downwards, projecting her voice into the box that holds my vinyl records.

"what creates can equally destroy," i'm purposely being cryptic and pretentious, simultaneously.

"alpha, omega," she turns and lays her eyes, full of concern, on me.

for a meager moment, neither of us lets a word escape from behind our teeth.

i sit on my side of the couch, trying to parse out our demons and see what battles we can fight as allies. i can only imagine our hands gently brushing each other as we remain indecisive in our choice to reach out and intertwine our fingers or keep them at bay. to succumb to the attractive forces and gravitate towards each others center, or to resist and strain at the pull.

i can sense her varying degrees of lament, but i don't want her to know that i know, too.

"there's love in those songs," i secretly wish for these words to be gleamed over and forgotten.

"this is our love," she pulls a record out and meticulously goes over the cover art from all angles before pulling the record out and placing it on the platter and gently placing the needle atop the record inside a groove. all i see is her genuine interest that shows in her sweet smile and round eyes. i want to be able to absorb her because she is everything that i am not. she is what completes this jigsaw puzzle, this amalgamation of imperfect emotions and unbalanced serotonin.

she is my dopamine drip, and i'd want this feeling to last for the rest of my life.

ring.