There was a playground down the street from where I lived. The swings were rusty and the chains squeaked every time you pushed me higher and higher. “Let me touch the sky,” I would plead, and you’d give my back an extra shove so that my feet swung high above me. Then, when I said the word, and just when I was high enough, I’d let go and you would run around in front of me and catch me in your arms. “Someday, we‘re going to come here with our children,” you said to me one day as we sat, curled together in the bottom of a slide. I was startled for a moment. I had never thought that far ahead in our future. But now, I could see it. Pigtails and overalls, animal crackers and you and I sitting on the bench together, watching our children play where we used to. “Yes,” I finally agreed, “Yes, we will.”

Shadows of you hide inside my mind, and I cannot even recall the last time my thoughts felt like my own. I cannot breathe; I crumble. What was life like before you? I cannot remember. How did I survive? How was I happy? Sharp breaths, gasping, sinking to the floor. You left me again, and this time, you won’t come back.