LOVE BUT NOT

They say love is like a firecracker, wrapped in the fragile shells of human hearts, a volatile fusion awaiting its moment to ignite the skies with its intensity. They say it is alight, like a dragon's breath, erupting into a cacophony of colors, illuminating the heavens with its glow. 

They sound happy when they talk about it, tickled pink and cheeks as pink as the cosmos that grow on the other side of the fence, for they like that kind of love, a love that is bright and vivid and glowing — a love that is _loud_. 

I've never liked firecrackers, they always feel too loud, booming like the thunderstorms you said was too childish to be afraid of, until I'm not sure which is louder — my heart, or the crackling flame. They make my knees shake uncontrollably, incapable of stopping, like a lone leaf clinging desperately to a brittle branch, trembling in the relentless grasp of an impending autumn storm. They burn like the lingering mark on my neck after the first firecracker I lit — the one you brushed off with a casual wave, claiming the searing red skin was nothing to cry over. 

Firecrackers are scary. But then, so is your love. 

For you yell, your voice a piercing shriek that echoes through the bleak expanse of this icy house of yours. It's weird, how amidst these frost-kissed walls and even frostier smiles, I find myself wondering whether I prefer your fire, an inferno that ravages everything I've painfully re-built in the spaces of time you leave me alone — or, if I prefer the ice age you seem so fond of bringing back, with its frostbitten embraces and cutting epithets. 

You ask me if I'll care if you were to die. You start by describing it, vivid words painting a picture I do not wish to see. You talk about me finding you on the floor of your house—for it is not _my_ house, you've made that quite clear—eyes vacant, and bleeding, you've always been firm in establishing the latter. And then, you ask me if I would care, if that is what _I_ want, pushing words into my mouth I hadn't ever even thought of. 

I tell you no, for it is true, and I don't mention how you started this because I told you the screaming scares me, and I don't tell you how I wish I was the one bleeding out on the cold tiles of the floor, instead. It feels unnecessary to mention. 

You weave tales like a skilled seamstress, plucking them from a tattered satchel of memories, embellishing them with shimmering sequins and swathes of fabric until they gleam with an illusion of splendor—“The truth,” you'd insist. “Not mere tales, I always speak the truth.” And I like stories, adore fables filled with dragons and damsels and angels and androsphinxes', I like how they make me feel like I'm anywhere but here (somewhere away from _you_).

But, unlike those fanciful tales, your stories are starkly different. They are bereft of gnomes or mythical beasts, devoid of fairies or sprites, bereft of any promise of treasure awaiting at the rainbow's end. No, your stories are all about _you_. And I like stories, any kind of story, but I don't like _your_ stories. 

Your stories make me uncomfortable. They coil around me like serpents, their fangs dripping with venom, each word spat out with such ferocity that I wonder if your tongue was forged in the heart of some ancient viper. You hiss out the phrases and strike ongoing objects with such hatred that it leaves me recoiling — it's why I'm always roaming around when you tell your stories, wandering aimlessly to ensure your grasp never tightens around _me_ — you seem to wield your tales like kindling, desperately attempting to ignite a blaze with your words, though I'm not quite sure whether it's me you seek to engulf in flames, or if the target even holds significance amidst the inferno you conjure.

You tell stories about yourself, in some stories you are the underdog, in others, you are the outcast; a hero in one, a victim in many others—but never a villain, never so. You talk about me too, dragging me into stories are distorting the version of the story I remember, the way you talk about me doesn't sound like me at all, but I don't say anything. And I don't mention how the way you talk about yourself doesn't sound like you either, though, for a different reason than mine. 

You resemble a spider, having already meticulously crafted your web, merely awaiting the unwitting flies to ensnare with a sense of hunger. Your silken threads wind around my ribs, weaving a binding cocoon that feels almost intrinsic to my being, and I fear the thought that one tug will cause them to collapse like a conquered empire. 

Every step I make only seems to dig my coffin deeper into the soil of mistakes, the bouquets I gather are always tainted; stained, with the essence of my being. It's as if I'm some kind of parasite — draining and despised and ever so undeserving. 

You exhaust me, like tending to a task that demands Herculean strength. It's as if I'm tasked with bearing the weight of the sky, summoning the sun at your whim, and cradling the moon to reflect its chilly grin.

They say that love is like a firecracker—loud, burning, and unforgiving. And I'd have to agree with them, for your love is nothing less than a wild, untamed firecracker.