In the light of day, my despair evaporates. with the sun shining, it's hard to imagine the aching sadness, the weight of 10 years of wandering the desert, alone and forsaken, suddenly coming down upon me in the middle of the night, unannounced and unexpected.

Lying awake in the darkness, I am trying to be still, trying to shut off my mind. Instead, I find myself rummaging through my memories, trying to find a single happy moment. An instance of joy that wasn't tainted by profound depression or tragic calamity.

In the last 10 years, the happiest relationship I have ever had is the one that never happened.

You know that something is wrong with you when one of the only high points you can think of in the last 10 years is when someone convinced you not to kill yourself.

But I remember lying besides her. Well not really beside her. I was a good foot, foot and a half away. Listening to her breathe, and knowing that the world was right.

There is something sick, sad, and desperate in this memory. Last night, it was the only thing that made me cease my restless worrying, my crazed anxiety. In this one moment that epitomizes my failures and my Pyrrhic victories when it comes to connecting with people, I am content. This is enough.

Barely. I am truly scavenging for crumbs here.

Long ago and far away, when my path was not yet set, when I still had hope, however faint and flickering, I remember driving the winding road, up the mountains and through the trees. She sat beside me, making sure I didn't fall asleep, commenting idly about how pretty the stars were. All those suns blazing in full glory.

There was also that brief nanosecond—sometimes I wonder if I just imagined it entirely—when she grabbed my hand and pulled me across the street. I don't even remember why we started hurrying, or where we were going, or where we were coming from.

10 years later, that's all I've got. Whatever mad fancies I hallucinated at the time have long ago receded, overtaken by reality.

Whether she remembers these things would matter very little. I would never speak of them to her.

It really is fucked up that these memories are the only things that keep me from death-spiralling into despair and self-destruction.

Oh well. Use whatever you've got, I guess.