I lost the one I loved. We could have drove all night, and he would still be here, but he settled for the motel instead. And I watched him disappear in the rear view. A part of me vanished with his touch. Now I’m not afraid to die—because he said we would be together in the future, but now the future has come, and seasons have changed. Feelings aren’t the same as they were in that painful exchange. He probably wouldn’t want to be with me now, anyways. Please understand why. It hurts to be alive. I feel unbearably out of place. I can’t put on a face anymore, in this new, empty space. I just want some rest. I think that would be for the best... Can I please have some rest...? Empty eyes in Angeles. I’m the girl whose last 10 cents is at the very bottom of her backpack. The pennies are buried beneath letters of her loneliness—ones that she‘ll never read, and that he’ll never see. Smile, laugh, and live in the moment, because everything is fine. It’s all in your head. Tomorrow you’ll see how beautiful the world can be. I keep telling myself this, but I don’t want it anymore. I don’t want any of it. Not his face in the back of my mind. Not her lips, like a phantom on my lips. Not this frigid apartment.  Not the disjointed memories, haunting me in my sleep. All of it cuts me like jagged shards of glass. I’m not craving an escape. If I wanted that, I would go to New Zealand, but I’m not going to. Adventure doesn’t call to me anymore. I don’t want to experience anything anymore. The past is a knife, the present is underwater, and the future is a bottle of pills.