Lost

This is how it's going to work. I'm going to see you, maybe two or three times a week, and I'm going to pretend that you don't exist. Then I'll see you on a day when I'm drunk enough on cheap wine from the convenience store two blocks away from my place and then we'll talk, and this is how it will all play out.

You: Why are you ignoring me?

Me: What are you talking about?

At this point, I'll laugh drunkenly and sling an arm around your shoulders. I'll pretend nothing is wrong and try to tease you into thinking that maybe you've been overcome by neurosis and that it's all in your head.

Things have changed, as much as I hate to admit it. It used to be that I could look at you, straight in the eye, and talk to you about anything, just about anything, and not be afraid to hold that gaze, or that you would look away first. It used to be that I could make you laugh and that you would understand every single thing about me and that we liked the same food and held each other's hands and had our own language that no one else would understand.

It used to be that you were mine, in some wonderful little way. But time has a way of changing things, turning them inside-out and making them so unrecognizable that they become completely different entities, and no matter how hard you try, you can no longer find what it was that you loved so much about them.

But then again, contrary to the natural order, there are things that stay the same, left behind forever in the aftermath of change. There are things, feelings, places...

Even people.