By: Nikita Gill

August echos of emptiness.

****

We parted in July. I loved you too much. I had not thought that would become too much for you to handle. And that we would part on a technicality.

It was a stormy eve. And the lightening broke us apart, so easily it almost made you glad.

I know. The storm outside matched the storm in your voice.

I’ll always be surprised at what can happen when two people begin to hate each other.

****

We fought in June.

When your work was getting you down and your parents were putting pressure on you and your world seemed to be falling apart.

I wanted to help you. I tried.

You told me to leave you alone.

I did.

****

We talked for hours in May.

And you told me about your life, about the broken dreams and the mesmerizing aspirations that you once had. And I told you about my responsibilities and my hopes. We understood each other.

We thought we would have an eternity to discuss other things. Like a future and the distance and the friends who thought you were not good enough and that I was too much of a dreamer.

****

We kissed in April.

Your lips tasted of the sea. The sea is a part of my childhood. A childhood where I sailed, and swam with dolphins, and danced with old sailors with wooden legs. A childhood where my grandmother made me fresh cream to eat with garden picked strawberries to eat at the beach. A childhood where my mother and I would run along the beach till we got soaked in the waves and my father wouldn’t stop laughing at us.

You tasted of my childhood.

****

We met in March. Three days post him.

Remember that March is important to me. It was the month in which I forgot two and a half years of pain, to be with you.

The sun shone that day after ten days of grey cloudy skies that threatened of storm. But it was March, so the storm evaded us completely.

It would come back.

It always does.

****

[Nikita Gill is a 25 year old madness once wrote an unknown book called Your Body is an Ocean and is now editor of a literary magazine called Modern Day Fairytales. A long time ago, she wrote a single line story for Monkeybicycle.net and was featured there. Email: nktgill@gmail.com]