[free-write]

[dreamwitch]

I want to give you words to drown in.

I want to say 'I love you', and you would see the world, and the moon and the moonlit glade and the chirruping birds and insects besides.

In all the metaphors, I'll show you mirrors. In all the masks you wear, I'll show you truths; some that you always knew, and some that you'd prefer not to have remembered. In these moments alone, will be your Catalyst. In all the lies, I'll tell you stories. In all the kindnesses, I'll allow the cruelty in, just enough for you to grow and change beyond my expectations. You'll become too strong to need me, and once you don't, I'll finally love you as much as you'd wanted; that's the bargain we make.

The story begins in the dark, or perhaps in the morning. Yes, the morning, that is the best time. Waking up, our dreams askew on top of our brows, barely situated and not yet ready for shambling over to the shower, making the coffee, stumbling out the door, all in the same awkward rhythm that's begun and ended every day previous. But before all that: here we are.
    
Here, in the first person, talking to you, my second person, that's where it starts. Here, where I imagine you, in this bare room. Here's where I write: these white concrete walls, a single old desk with a laptop, a pitcher of water, and a coffeemaker on another chair. There's a few wildflowers in an cheap glass vase in front of me, the only piece of decoration. With the light spilling through the windows to the right of me, the blank expanse of pure white towering above and around me, I am cocooned in silence enough to see you.

You'll sit on this stool (here) and I'll look at you (there), and I'll tell you a story about you (again) as you wait (for me). You don't know me enough to be irritated or exasperated or confused; you don't know me well enough to roll your eyes, or resent me, or need me, or reject me. Yet you live inside me. Here it starts.

After a moment, I decide to give you a name, but it's a stolen name; let's say I call you Fool.

Oh, I see you smile; how presumptious of me. To so name you, already I've nailed you down far beyond my means. You are no longer mine, no longer part of me. This is a stolen story; these words are no longer ours.

And yet I want to know you. Go ahead, tell me who you are.

No, no, not the hair (pale gold) or the eyes (also gold) or the mouth (a mocking smile, full of secrets) or the way you cock your head, listening to something I cannot hear. I want to know you, and just as I wanted you to be enthralled, so I am now enthralled. You aren't mine; rather, I am yours, and through me you can find as much life as you can bear to hold.

Still you sit on that old metal stool, a model character. Your long legs stretched in front of you, your mouth trembling in between a smile and a frown, you need not say a thing. You have a story, but what does it matter now? Your story no longer contains you. You, unlike me, you exist outside of time. Your joys and sorrows are always present in the foreground, and yet never meant to fully drown you; you cannot drown. You must live, and endure, and stay perfectly yourself. Perhaps this pains you, but it never shows. You know this frustrates me, and yet allures me just the same. Stay longer, and I may yet understand you, I say, and for a little while you indulge me.