I went into my closet today and brought out a clay mushroom man. I placed him on my dresser—no, that didn’t look right. I placed him on my desk. In the far left corner by a green knitted hat, he sits and watches me—his mouth forever morphed into a tormented “o” shape. 

He wants to say something to me, scream something at me, but I shift the covers and slide out of bed to force his retreat back into the messy shelves of my closet. Before he goes, he whispers something, faint enough so they don’t overhear, but he knows about that day at that place and that water. Flowing from my eyes as he speaks, like a ghost I watch, narrating down to the minuscule freckles on your chin. I stop him and ask, “How could you have been there and not here?”

I would assume that he has been following me everywhere; maybe I should have kept better track of him all of this time, instead of locking him up and throwing away the key. Maybe. But we know better than to base an entire life of would haves; some people are meant to be shut in the dark, while others blink wide to watch the sunrise reflect over the cracks in the blinds.

I am theorizing with ceramic mushroom men and squinting underneath fluorescent light bulbs for seven hours a day. It’s safer this way, warmer. It’s comforting to know that nothing is ever going to change. I know exactly what to expect the next day, down to each individual tick on the red clock downstairs. But when you come along, my eyes can’t quite adjust to the offensive nature of the glare through my windows—I try and almost find them obscenely beautiful. But it makes me miss it even more, and it’s a habit, I know, but now, I don’t know if I am you or him or both—just know that I am no longer me.

In a perfect world, there would be carbon copies of every single person I have ever met, another time and another chance, but this is my world, and it’s not perfect; it might not even be big enough to fit you in it. But please, don’t take this as an answer nor an invitation. Take it as the rough patches of static that bleed into the corners of your vision as you try to fall asleep at night—take me with you into your version of my dark place as I have held your skeleton fingers through mine.

I hope you feel me dancing across your brain as you try to focus on anything else but the water splashing cold on your back—I hope it gives you a headache, but not one that’s painful, more irritated, nagging, pulling at your ears and standing up the hairs on the back of your neck as you move your elbow to grasp at the sweat beading down the base of your neck. I hope you watch on that day at that place with the water. Flowing from your eyes as he speaks, and like a ghost you watch, narrating down to my thumbs, tapping lightly on the black leather of the steering wheel.

And then you stop him and ask, “How could you have been there and not here?”