andrew

it's the name less people know you by, it's a name reserved for the lovers of trivia and those most devoted to you. it's thread that contorts itself into the shape of "trouble" when it falls to the ground. it flies out of the mouths of few people, swims in the eyes of close to none. but it's always been your name. your second, but your name nonetheless.

a year ago i made my mind your home. my version of "you." my puzzle-pieced-up version of you. the only words that came out of your mouth were the only words i could hear you say. your vocabulary grew within months and i never knew everything. you were a quilt: comforting and covering and on top and warm and made out of patches of the small things my eyes have seen of you.

today my eyes are still seeing. new things and old things and things that might have never mattered had you not –

i will never know who you are, mon cher acteur, mon cher amour – or who you were, because that is more grammatically correct, given the situation we found ourselves in, but that has never been the way anything felt when it came to you.

some days you are still the most gorgeous, and still the first, because you were the first, and you were the start of a lot of things – but that place is not yours anymore, my dear. but your place is still your place no matter where it is, and that is in my heart. just like in licorice and sugar and gummy worms and gummy bears. just like in candy.

but my mind is not your home anymore. but you still have my heart. not all of it, but a part of this blood-pumping organ much like my clenched fist is yours.

i've been clenching my fists since you –