Gold turns black in darkness

I need to return to the mall. You do not understand. This is non-negotiable. I need to return to Banana Republic and buy the jacket I fell in love with two days ago. And I need someone there to tell me the jacket fits but the shirts do not. And I need that person to take my wallet and shove it down her pants, tell me she knows I would never go there, and yell at me to stop spending. And I need the mall to laugh at my misfortune and comfort me just as this person does as we sit by the window, sipping nondescript cooled drinks with names like iced-mocha-frappa-mint-vanilla-coolata.

The drink itself is unimportant and the setting seems superficial, but for once, just one moment in time, does everything seem like it will all work out. At first, it's uncomfortable. What should we say? What is there to say? The pain you feel, I feel too. That hole in your heart, I feel the same. We are not so different, are we?

Those long nights as I wipe down the tables after work, you sit there, offering your words. If only you knew how much those words meant. The store is empty and I am the only one left but I'm not lonely. For once I'm not alone. Emptiness brings about images of darkness, holes, some sort of absence. But to me, emptiness is having people around, with their arms extended, smiling at me, telling me I can be better. I can do better. I can change. I can be greater. I will only get worse if I don't accept their help. Do they not see me, in my cage, laughing and crying at the same time? There is blood on the walls. The food is left uneaten and spoiled. And I turn, rip a strip of fabric off my shirt, and fashion a blindfold around my head for I no longer want to see the gold.

Do you know what it feels like to want to hug and punch someone at the same time? To want to laugh and cry, to live and die? To want to say yes and no and all those words of conflict that fight for their right to be expressed? Of course you do, your presence tells me you do. For we wouldn't be here, sitting by the window, finally sailing from the chains that bounded us. We have already said all we need to and silently agree to move on. Trifles like those who hurt us in the past no longer matter. It still pains, but through the laughter, you can't tell. And there we shall be, debating whether or not the person behind you is indeed a man or a woman.

Call me crazy. Call me those disgusting, despicable words society attributes to the weak and unwashed. Say it to my face and watch me smile-a smile that, apart from all other smiles, is unmistakably genuine. And remember that smile.

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