I mix the cookie dough with a calm pleasure,

measuring carefully as the amounts are especially important to get right on this day.

Time to bake.

I walk through my home,

this pleace is beautiful and bursting at its seams with memories.

We did a good job, I think to myself.

When he died I never thought I’d truly live again,

but then life was kind to me.

I sign the letters to our kids,

place the stamps deliberately,

and walk outside to our mailbox.

The day is a beautiful one, a dry 70 F.

I am surrounded by life in varying shades of green.

We chose a good place to call home, love.

I come back inside to the smell of ooey gooey chocolate chip cookes,

still my favorite after all of these years.

I pull the cookies out and set them one by one on the cooling rack. While I wait for them to cool I light a pre-roll, I only buy pre-rolls now as my hands aren’t what they used to be.

I sit back in my lawn chair and enjoy the sky.

I wish you were here my sweet.

It’s almost time, I think.

I put the cookies on a plate and take them outside to enjoy with my smoke.

It’s time to write. With a heavy pen, I write the very last thing I ever will write. I seal the note in an envelope.

I polish off the cookies one by one, until my belly is full and my eyes begin to droop. Before it’s too late, I dial 9-1-1. I light my joint to smoke one last time.

The note is all they’ll need to understand that this is my goodbye.

“This isn’t the time to fight. They’ve caught it too late and at this point in my life, I am ready to die. To die, like this, of my own volition is the only way I can bear to say Goodbye.”

I let my eyes close and drift off to sleep.

You wrapped your arms around me

in a warm embrace,

mumbling,

"goodbye"

and I laughed to myself,

the only time I get to hold you,

is when you are leaving...

You see her gliding across the floor, hand in hand with him. She stares into his eyes and breaks into that infectious smile. You find yourself smiling as well and are surprised by the tears that drop into your glass of wine. You had promised yourself...and her that you wouldn’t do this. Not today!

You’ve heard the whispers. That she looks more beautiful today than ever before. Jaw-dropping beautiful. You know that it's not completely true. She has always been taking your breath away and for you it's hard to pick when she was most beautiful. Today, though, can make it in to the top five.

And you go through those momentous five as you watch her laugh at something he says and kiss him like he's her favourite drink and she has been dehydrated. The Big Five, you call them in your head.

She was her most beautiful self the day, twenty seven years ago, when they placed her in your hands and declared you had a girl. So small, so dependent. The wave of love that hit you as you gazed into her small perfect face added new dimensions to your definition of love. Her name was like honey on your lips, begging you to taste more and more of it. And you did! All night as you cradled her against your bossom, you breathed her name, sang it, shouted it, spoke it. It didn't matter. Here was someone who was completely yours without question.

She was her most charming self at the age of five. You caught a glimpse of the woman she could be as her personality raced to settle itself. So fierce, so stubborn. The fear of a thousand unnamed dangers in a world that wasn't ready for her, least of all deserved her, kept you awake at night. She taught you to fight those fears on your knees, to trust God. And you did! You prayed when you woke, when she woke, before she slept, before you slept. It didn't matter. Here was someone you would fight heaven and earth for.

She was her most attractive self at sixteen, somewhere square in that teen-age. She was learning to own the changes in her growing body. So clumsy, so graceful. The hope of a bright future for her kept you hooked to all the things that made an impact on her. You wanted to guide her and keep her from wrong decisions. And you did! You talked openly, to the dismay of your friends, and she trusted you as her compass that steered her from bad friends and addictions. It didn't matter. Here was someone who was your every dream come true.

She was her most sophisticated self when she announced her changes; her new job, her boyfriend and how she was thinking of her own apartment. So independent, so young. The reality of womanhood resting on her shoulders showed you your time together was almost up. She was walking into her future like you always dreamed, loved. And she did! She's made decisions that reflect her values and her heart. You can trust her with her life now. Here is someone that you'll never have too much of. With all the time in the world, you will still always want a little more.

She is stunning today! And it's a goodbye of sorts, making room for change. She'll never call out to you again to kiss away her nightmares in the middle of the night. She'll never tumble into your room in awkward moments to cry her heart out. She'll never be waiting in her room on her birthday for your breakfast-in-bed routine. You can't expect her to break out into spontaneous performances just to get you to laugh. Instead, she's the one who will be looking forward to those things.

And you are glad that she gets that. If you must say so, she picked a good guy and you are expectant about what the future will bring her way.

I watched her from across the class, she was standing with her two best friends: Lily and Holly. They were chatting, laughing, smiling.

She had the most beautiful smile, a smile that gave me shivers, goose bumps. A smile that made me smile.

She was popular, social. I wasn’t. I was a ‘nerd’, seen as weird. But she didn’t, she accepted me; that was her true beauty. The beauty that others overlooked as they only looked at the outside, her outside.

They didn’t care to look deeper, to see the truest beauty: her acceptance of anyone.

It made me feel accepted, welcome... it made me feel normal.

As I thought about it, I felt guilty for her, because from her outside, people would make a decision, a judgement.

They would see a confident, beautiful girl.

Some would see her as a threat, so they would gossip and avoid her.

Some would see her as a pretty face and solely a pretty face, nothing else.

The guys would see her as their future girlfriend.

The rest would see her as a good person to be around because of her fame, because of her looks.

They would label her: 'she is this', 'she is that'.

Anything but: 'she is a person, an amazing person. A likable person who is beautiful, talented and amazing. The love of my life.'

Thinking about this made me feel sick, nauseated. Can't we just accept people for who and what they are? Stop fitting them with stereotypes, stop labelling them?

As I sat there, in my seat, thinking of this, of her. I remembered the good days, the days when we were together. When we were friends, when we were more than friends. I smiled at those thoughts, those memories. We would hold hands; we would hold each other. We were there for one another, when we would catch each other looking from across the room.

But then a dark cloud came over us and we fought. We were screaming, yelling. Cursing each other and, well, I cursed myself.

We just had this tension, this feeling that we weren't enough for each other. We had this constant fear that the other would abandon us, for someone better.

And, well, this tension, we felt it. It then became enough, and we broke up a few days ago, and now I sit here, alone, and she stands there with her friends.

I knew it was over after the fight, because a day after, she looked at me but it wasn't the same look. Her gaze was empty, hollow. No longer loving, no longer smiling at me.

This hurt, a lot. But I blamed myself. I could've been someone else, someone better for her, but did I? No.

I could have been her perfect someone.

I never change.

Another guy approaches her group.

She smiles and walks up to him. Her smile made me stiffen.

I understood it; the smile said it all. It was saying goodbye. Good bye to me. To us.

''Hey,'' he says, holding her hands.

''Hi.'' She replies.

''Goodbye,'' I replied, quietly to her smile.

Please, take care of her.

I beg of you. Be what I couldn't be, what I never will be.

6.6.2020

“Haven’t you heard? There’s this Japanese legend that says that your current face is the face of the person you loved most in your last life.”

I couldn’t help but to laugh at the words ringing through my head, but the more I thought of it, the more upset I became. If that was the case, then I had been awfully rude to the person who I loved in my past life. The constant poking and prodding and what if my nose were this way or that way. I sat in the mirror and contemplated, I should be nicer…

That simple statement kept me being kind to myself throughout my whole life, and now I sit here, staring at myself in the reflection of my lover’s eyes as he watches the light fade from mine. “Goodbye…” I whisper to my reflection. But then I take my hand and lay it on his cheek, feeling the hot tears slide down my palm, “I can’t wait to be so beautiful in the next life… goodbye.”

goodbye?

You have grown so much, old friend.

Wow, you are so big now.

You have aged physically and mentally I see.

It isn't goodbye friend.

It is merely a time before your offspring come.

And I will fulfill the same purpose.

So goodbye until then.

I stroked your soft hand for the last time, as I gingerly set you down in the dirt. It was the final goodbye. Seven amazing years had come down to this very moment. We had survived you losing an arm, me combing out a lot of your hair, nudity, scrapes, bruises, and a dastardly younger brother. The unchanging look in your soft hazel eyes nearly broke my heart. You were dressed for the other world, with the colorful leopard-print dress I'd made for you with fabric and ribbon, the thigh-high boots you adored, and a necklace I'd made with my own two hands out of golden pipe cleaner.

I felt the tears come, but I couldn't let your last vision of me be of me hurting. Not like this. I wanted you to remember the happier times of you and John Cena and your kids. I didn't want you to think of me or wonder if I was only letting you go because of some bullshit status quo that by thirteen, you should be done with dolls. Despite the ruthless undertaking of your family, we had been together through thick and thin, and the end was almost becoming too much.

I straightened the necklace one last time and placed a kiss on your forehead before letting the dirt cover up those bright hazel eyes, your brown hair that I had finally figured out how to braid, the boots, your dress, your pouty look. Every tiny scoop I scraped into the hole just made us further and further apart, though I knew that once you were finally covered, we would both find peace.

As I was approaching the very day I've been training for my strongest teachers were gathering for their celebration. Everybody's efforts time sweat and tears are going to be realized in my last final exam.

The whole of all our endless days in lectures physical training and mock combat are now mine. For years I never understood why I was being given certain information and particular instructions. All of humanity needed for this goodbye to take place.

In foreign countries and far away places the other players too were preparing to say a sweet goodbye. Each of us needed to be at the right place at the right time. Soon a final confrontation between freedom love and peace was going to happen with hate evil and abuse.

This goodbye was such a joyful event people everywhere were celebrating the farewells. From all the training and strategy was going to be a quick end to evil everywhere. My teachers waving goodbye in their finest robes and decorations. Now is the time to walk away from my protection and finish the work I've been training for.

We were small in number but the enemy was thrown into confusion. As I was walking straight towards the things that years before would have frightened me I could feel the pleasure of those saying goodbye. I looked back one last time to see the heightened energy from my well wishers waving goodbye.

After the victory shared among all of my fellow workers the loudly heard celebration could be heard all over the world. Most of the army I just joined forces with returned back to where they came from. For me I felt the goodbye was so pure and fierce. Going back was sure to break the grace. I wanted to keep going keep growing bigger and bigger.

The smell of bacon

saturates the small kitchen

Dishes clink, suds wash

away the remains of us

A moment ago

we used to be strangers, then

you opened your mouth

Laughter fills the small kitchen

cozy with comfort

We sit and sip together

pouring out our hearts

over steaming cups of tea

You said: ” We’re friends now,”

I guess it was that easy

You smile, and I laugh

-A moment ago strangers-

I know you’ll leave soon

My jaw is sore from laughter

I’m glad you were here