this is not my obligation

you'll say,
did they love you or what?
and i'll say
the love what i do - the only one who really loves me is you.
and you'll say,
girl, did you kick some butt??
and i'll say
i don't really remember... but my fingers are sore and my voice is tender.

The wind is exploding the amber leaves outside, flicking them off the earth, plucking big yellow sheets off the trees, twisting branches, refusing to let go.

Song for today - Oren Lavie's Her Morning Elegance.

And, she fights for her life as she puts on her coat, and she fights for her life on the train. She looks at the rain, as it pours... And she fights for her life as she goes in a store, with a thought she has caught by a thread. She pays for the bread, and she goes - nobody knows.

I wake up with my hair greasy from the people who have run their fingers though it. It takes a second for me to realise I'm late for running over to see Mailee before she leaves so I roll over and there's someone knocking on the door, and in comes the guy from the night before who wouldn't leave my room. I growl a conversation at him, the original Miss Grumpy. Then I bite my pillow and pluck up the paranoia to get out of bed and change my pj bums for a skirt, put monkey hat on over the thick greasy mask covering my skull, pick up a carton of juice which has been out of the fridge for a few days, fall over the internet cable, find my face next to a mostly empty buiscuit packet. This is not what I expected to be there. I stand up and jam my toes into my shoes, borrow Eva's phone to call Mailee so she'll let me in, almost fall down the concrete stairs again, and walk down the slippery road to the carpeted luxury of Opal. I need to ask Mailee if I can borrow her oven when she gets back, to bake some cupcakes. I forget to do this. Instead, I write a birthday card, am disorientated and probably awful at conversation, and am amazed by her beauty but forget to tell her this. Why can I not be wearing a pretty dress? My mind is proud of her but it's like when you write something you don't understand into your essay just to sound clever - I could never look that good even if I wore that dress. Sad times. Devotion unswerving I get over it and we go downstairs and I remember glaring at Matt and getting with... three? guys in a row infront of him because he was NOT my only option. Waltz through the empty streets.

Desperado, why don't you come to your senses? You're a hard one! But I know that you've got your reasons, these things that are pleasing you can hurt you somehow.

Why is autumn not heavy with fruit? I walk past an apple tree when I go into town and all the apples are rotten and I think of them as empty and squidgy, soft gourds which would disintegrate under my touch.

Do you remember everything?

Maybe.

The bathrooms in Rococo's are my favourite place to talk to myself.

I've run out of credit, again.

I don't know what you and your sisters do, but please don't - please stop - this is not my obligation.

How many lies can we all tell?

Are my kisses lies?

I think so.

'don't do this, i don't understand why pretty girls can't just admit they're beautiful!'
'i'm not'
'at least you can say you're not ugly'

You've got it all wrong! Why the hell do you feel the need to compliment my appearance, to force me to agree with your idea of what I want to hear?

'Please leave'
'But I'm comfortable'
'I need to sleep'
'No! You don't have any lectures tomorrow!'
'So? I still need sleep.'
'I'll be really quiet'

What the hell? Are you a four year old? I love having someone I love in my bed. Love in that broad sense. In my bed in the spatial sense. Yeah, it's lonely if there's no one there. I'm not getting locked into depending on that though. I don't mind being lonely.