i call his number seven times in the space of an hour. no answer. no surprise. no thought to time distance or fatigue. or where he might or might not be, at the moment. fall into the puddle-and-drown version of me. and even though i don't think that well in the first person. i wait for the tone. each time. calm. methodical. the ring. the break. the skinned knees and weired-out crazy no-good fucked-up version of me just keeps coming out. every. single. fucking. time. like a bad video that i want to delete, but. can't. seem. to. figure. out. how. to stop replaying. the last time, when i hear his voice, and i am tired and worn, of these days, i just sob--stupid and still--into the deafening tones of the silence of an in-box, probably now, too full. even to record. and with the reckoning that he probably won't even listen to. these random belligerent and strange long-many-messages. from someone he doesn't seem to know. at all. if it was. ever. love. to be sure. he would have answered. the fucking phone. no, i'm not playing at games of 'loves me' or 'loves me not'.

this time. seriously. i am. not. joking.