Whoever said money can’t buy happiness doesn’t know how far away you are. They don’t know that money would buy me a day, a week, a lifetime with you. It could buy me the distance and buy me the time. It could buy me the hour that I’m completely content, void of all thoughts that make things anything less than alright. 

Sometimes I forget what I’m doing here. I have to list all the reasons I can’t go, and you can’t stay. I have to convince myself there’s a reason you’re where you are. And we can’t be here or there…anywhere together. And it takes all I have in me to not get in the car and come get you. Just to sit across from you in a diner and listen to anything you want to say. It takes every ounce of strength in my body not to run away. I’d walk every interstate if it meant I could fall asleep where you are. 

Sometimes I can feel my arms weighed down with the people I’m not holding. Sore and sinking like there’s too much space. Too much quiet for one person to deal with. Empty beds and empty floors; it seems like it shouldn’t be this way.

I can almost feel it in my lungs. Like the way it’s hard to breathe when you’re under a blanket for a long time. Or when you’ve laughed too much and you need time to get your heartbeat back to a normal rhythm. Or when you feel like if you start to speak you’ll start crying. 

I’ve felt that way for a long time. Like the world is spinning too fast but not fast enough to see you again. Or when I find myself using the word “stay” so often, I don’t think about it. It just makes sense to ask you. Even if I already know the answer. 

I’ve reasoned with myself that I spend too much time missing. Either missing or counting down. And I’ve bargained with the stars, with the universe, with you, -really anyone who will listen- to give me another chance. And sometimes I believe it’ll work. That you’ll turn around and stay another night. That you’ll cancel your flight, miss the train. That for just once, you’ll give in. 

But it doesn’t work that way. 

So I’ll stand in the terminal and I’ll wait across the tracks. I’ll walk home alone and I’ll read your license plate as you drive away and count down the days until I see you coming back home.