Ofrecer amistad a el que pide amor es como ofrecer pan a el que muere de sed.

You ask me. Again.

‘What?’

You repeat yourself.

I don’t say anything.

And you really need me to explain my silence to you?

‘I wish I could reciprocate,’ you say.

Fuck. Your eyes are so big and I can see myself reflected in them.

I’m crying. If I concentrate really hard I can (almost) convince myself the tears are coming out of your eyes. Or am I crying? No, not yet. 

‘Are you alright? You’re face is trembling.’

Really? Yeah. I think I’m having a stroke. What the fuck do you think?

I lie there looking at my reflection in your big, bright, beautiful pupils, feeling like a picture of a pale, rotting cadaver in a beautiful, crystal picture frame and trying to straighten my face out as it scrunches up more and more tightly with the pain of it all. Again.

You lie there in patient silence, waiting for me to finish. You’re use to it. How many times have we been here now?

And after a few moments, miracle of miracles, I stop quivering. I stop screaming all those words you’ll never hear. Just in time, too. Calmly as possible, I tell myself:

Suck your stomach in. That’ll help. Straighten up. You look hunched. God, what am I wearing?

And finally, I say it. Not very loudly, and with very little conviction, but nevertheless, thunderous applause for my bravery breaks out in my mind as soon as I manage to utter those fatal words. Again.: 

I’m fine.

Love: an exercise in Narcissism.