When I woke up, 
Mom and Dad are rolling on the couch,
Rolling numbers,
“10”
Rock and Rolling,
“9”
Got my Kiss records out!
“8”
Mommy’s alright,
“7”
Daddy’s Alright,
“6”
They just seem a little weird,
“5”
Surrender,
“4”
Surrender!
“3”
But don’t give yourself,
“2”
Away,
“1”
Awaaaay!
“Happy New Year!!!”

The music goes loud and the screams go louder, twenty or so people hugging, kissing and celebrating the start of yet another year. Happy New Year to us all... I hit “Send” as soon as the countdown ends, no use in calling her since the lines are all jammed up with fuckers like me trying to call someone special with whom they just couldn’t be with this day.
They say the way you spend your new year is the way you’ll spend the rest of the year. So we should all try to make the best of those last 24 hours. I don’t believe that shit. I spent my last three or four new year’s eves as a bachelor, fucking the brains out of twenty-year-old girls whose names I can’t even recall, and I haven’t spent those years fucking twenty-year-old girls. So, as long as I can tell, the whole “New Year’s Eve” myth was lost on me long ago... 
“Happy New Year Dean!” I turn around and there they are, three of my closest friends, drunk as shit, their eyes shining with inebriation, reflecting the flaring lights of the fireworks in the sky, which they won’t remember tomorrow morning. I’m way behind in the whole “drinking myself stupid” tradition, so I take one of their glasses and chug it down as they all cheer. 
“Well, we’re off to town to try and score some blow and some women. You coming?” Asks Rick. The overpronunciation on each of those words, lets me know how hammered he really is. Rick was only happy when those three elements could be combined: drinking, drugs and women. 
“Yeah I just gotta try and call her; I’ll meet you guys there,” I reply.
“You know, one of these days, you’ll have to show me your balls…cause I’m starting to doubt you even have them” said Bill, tilting his glass back and forth as he spoke, spilling half his drink on the already flooded tiles. “Screw her man, she bailed on you, didn’t she? Let her call!”
Bill didn’t have that many friends. He was always straightforward in his answers, and most people thought he was crude and offensive, but honestly, he was the only guy who just spoke his mind. He meant no harm with what he said, but he wasn’t going to soften any blows. He just spoke. No filter on. That’s why I valued his opinions. And once again, he was right. I close the lid on my cell and tell myself “Fuck it, she’ll call.”
As soon as I end my line of thought, the vibrating buzz on my pocket lets me know Bill was right. She should be the one calling. I look at the lid. Johnny’s number comes up. Maybe she was calling from his cell. 
“Hey Johnny, Happy New Year man!”
“Hey, man! Happy new year to you too. Listen, do you have a minute?”
“Sure, let me just go into the bathroom so I can hear you.”
I slide past a drunken crowd with relative ease. Lucky me no one was puking on the toilet so it was free. I get in; lock the door behind me and the music fades down to a tolerable volume. 
“Yeah, I’m here, what’s up Johnny?”
“Well…I’ve grown to like you over these years man so I just thought you should know…it’s her…there’s something wrong.”
My heart skips a beat as soon as that sentence reaches my side of the phone. I slam the wall with my fist closed. I should have fucking been there. Something’s wrong with her and I’m drunk and 30 miles away…
“What happened? Is she okay? What the fuck’s wrong?”
“Well you’re not gonna like this man…she’s…well she’s clearly blackout drunk…she was talking to her ex…and they both got in a room and haven’t left for twenty minutes…”
My concern turns into blind rage. I hit the wall again, this time strongly enough to stain it with blood.
“Thanks Johnny” I calmly say, hanging up the phone. I scream out in anger, hitting the wall consecutively, each blow to the concrete spraying in red speckles from my now injured fist.
“Save it Dean” I think to myself. I stop for a minute. In my head, everything goes silent. No music, no voices, just my heart resounding in my ears and Johnny’s words echoing in my mind. Fuck…this isn’t going to end like this.
I come back to reality, someone’s knocking on the bathroom door, angry at my delay. 
“Get the fuck out man, other people need to go there!”
I ignore them. Pick up the phone and call the only person I know who is still sober on New Year’s Eve. 
“Hey Dean! Happy new year!!!”
“Thanks Mary, happy new year to you too babe. Listen…I need a favour…a big, fucked up favour right now…are you still sober?”
Mary takes her time answering my question. She knows I never ask her any favours so she’s undecided between her obvious will to help and the effort she knows she’s going to have to put into doing it. 
“Yeah, I am…what do you need?”
“I need you to pick me up and drop me off at her place.”
“Fuck…something’s wrong?”
“Yeah…” I let out, in an herculean effort to keep myself from crumbling down to tears. She knows I’m serious, I hear the hastiness in her voice as she asks me:
“Do you need me to do anything?” the soft tingling from the car keys in her hand lets me know she’s already coming. 
“You’re doing it already…just drop me off there. Please.”
She hangs up, no goodbyes necessary, I’ve known her for 22 years and she knows I’m way too shocked to worry about being polite.
Ten long, painful minutes later she arrives, opens the door on my side and lets me in. We don’t share a word on the whole way there. She’s stepping on the gas, we’re going as fast as her car allows us to go. Knowing her fear from high-speed driving, I know she’s desperately trying to help me get there as fast as she can. In my mind, I am thankful. But my lips stay sealed.
We get there in ten minutes. The house was a mess. Coloured lights coming from every window, the music, loud enough to cater to a whole fucking town. Roughly fifteen people outside, half of them puking, the other half making out with each other…the door wasn’t even opened - there was no door. Someone kicked it off its hinges, resting now, horizontally, three feet behind where it should be.
I get inside, climb on top of the nearest chair and look for Johnny’s face amid a smoke filled, booze-smelling half-conscious crowd. 
“Johnny!” I yell out. Some girl pulls me down and screams into my ear.
“Johnny’s in the living room, back there!”
There’s bound to be about thirty different Johnnies in this party, yet this drunken girl’s lead is all I got to search for him so I thank her and move in.
Luckily to me, there’s Johnny, in the living room, half drunk and half worried to see me. Yet he comes over to me and shakes my hand.
“Where is she?” I ask. “Which room?”
“Look man, if she knows I called you, she’s going hate me for a long time…” Johnny was one of her closest friends, he knows he was doing the right thing yet he also knew I wasn’t going to go down easily…and that scared him. “What are you gonna do?”
I smile at him. It was clear he was making an effort to take my side. He loved her, as a friend, for as long as they have known each other. Kind of like me and Mary. Yet he knew how much I liked her…so he was stepping down from the good friend position into the good guy spot…and it was aching him to do so.
“Don’t worry about me, I don’t want you getting involved in any way…you’ve done enough.”
“I just hope I haven’t done too much…”
I go into the room he pointed me to, and there they were, both drunk, already half naked, she was beneath him, arching her back, head leaned back as he kissed her neck. They don’t even notice I’m there. I pick up her cell phone. It was on the nightstand. 1 Unread Message… what a fucking surprise. I come out, close the door behind me and go over to Johnny. 
“Read it,” I say, handing him her phone. He asks no questions, takes the phone, unlocks it and starts reading the message.
“Happy New Year…I Love you. Move in with me.*”
Johnny smiles as he reads it, he is now sure he did the right thing by calling me over. I was glad I could provide him some closure in this whole goddamn mess…
“Why the fuck did she have to screw this up…”
“Don’t worry Johnny, better now than in ten years.”
“I’m gonna go put the music louder, that should buy you some time alone in there with them…he’s a fucking prick. I’m guessing the only people who will try and fight back are his two friends sitting by the bar over there…the rest of the guys couldn’t care less.”
I hug Johnny and thank him. We both knew this was probably going to be the last time we spoke for a long time. He liked me but she was his best friend…no way I could compete with that. Too bad. I was going to miss Johnny…
I get in the room, he’s still on top, half-naked, caressing her breasts as she runs her hands through his chest. I was smiling, thinking to myself I should probably hit her, not him. But my dad always taught me not to hit a woman…too bad for him.
I pick up the lamp, standing unlit by the bed, pull out the cord and swing the object as hard as I can into his head. The smashing hit, followed by the awakening sound of the lightbulb, shattering down as its million pieces rain all over the bed, wakes them up from their sensual trance. She starts screaming, confused. He grabs on to his head still shocked by the blunt trauma. I pick him up by the neck with one hand and slam him into the nearest wall. My fist cringes as it closes down, still bleeding from the practice hits on that bathroom wall. This was no practice hit. I smash my hand into his chin with the strength of a man who knows he is right. There’s no stronger punch than that. A blow delivered not by hate but by self-respect. Pride. And stupidity.
The hit resounds in my ears, echoing louder than her screams, everyone else’s voices and the loud music. In my head, that was the sound of a five-year relationship ending with a bang. No sound could compare to it right now.
Her exes’ eyes roll up before closing down, his head tilts to the left as his whole body falls down to the ground, unconscious.
She keeps screaming, asking me how could I've done this in between sobs and "I'm Sorry"'s. Fuck her. I'm not even gonna dignify that with an answer. 
Finally, the door opens, and some guy leans in his head, probably startled by the screams. There was glass everywhere, a bleeding guy on the floor and a girl crying. Then there was me. Needless to say, I'm the bad guy in this scenario for any clueless soul that walks in. 
"What the fuck man? What did you do?" he yells at me, getting some more attention from the other clueless morons standing next to him.
"This is none of your business, he's okay, I just punched him." I say.
As I'm finishing up my sentence, the two guys from the bar start moving through the crowd in my direction. They knew this was the room where his friend was about to fuck my ex-girlfriend. They knew. Let them come. Once again, the blinding rage of being betrayed clouds my judgment. It's her fucking fault, yet two more guys will pay her price. Because I'm proud. And stupid.
They come at me, one guy pushes me back yelling "See what you did? It's your girls' fault. She was the bitch here, not him."
That did it. Thanks "soon to be knocked down" idiot. You just fueled my rage for the next two minutes. I move at him, dodge the first punch to the face, and take the second one in the stomach as I'm already rotating my body clockwise, my elbow to his face with the momentum of a full-body swing. Blood everywhere, that's a cracked nose to say the least. He holds on to it as he curses me off, moving, hunched over towards the ground into the kitchen, keeping his free hand a little lower to catch the dripping blood that runs towards the floor.
The other guy looks confused, his courage diminished by his friend's unfortunate fate.
"You're a fucking idiot! Those are my friends you just hurt!" 
"I'm not in the mood to chat, you either move up or shut the fuck up and move away" I answer. Courage I didn't know I had spoke in my name...
He moves away, looking for his friend to try and help him with his nose job.
Fuck this. This whole mess could have been avoided...Fuck her decision to spend New Year's with her friends. Fuck my decision for not wanting to tag along. Fuck our fight this morning. Fuck me for still being in love with her. And fuck her for not loving me back when alcohol eluded her conscience.
"FUUUCK!" I scream, now outside. The drunken idiots by the house's entrance stare at me as if I'm about to explode. I was. 
I smile as tears fall down my face into the asphalt. It's been so fucking long I've cried, I had forgotten how good it can feel. 
That damn "Cheap Trick" song comes up again. 
It's my phone. 
It's her. 
I let it ring...


"Mommy told me, 


yeah she told me,


I'd meet girls like you.


She also told me,


Stay away, 


You'll never know what you'll catch..."

"The youth is starting to change me."

How was it?

What?

Your first day at the new job, you goof. What else?

It was awful, I looked so bad. I didn't know what to do, where anything was, I was a nervous wreck...I bet they hated me.

No they didn't. They were expecting it. I called and told them you sucked at what you did.

That's not funny...not today.

Hey...calm down. Even if you were bad, which I doubt, it's completely normal. I sucked at my first day too.

You know, you're three thousand miles away and I...I just need you here now...

Okay go outside...

Why?

Just go outside...

Fine...

...

I'm outside.

Look up. Can you see the stars? Or is it cloudy there?

No, it's clear. Why?

Funny thing about the stars is they look exactly the same from where you are and from where I am...Remember the "W" I told you about once? The cassiopeia constellation?

Yeah, I do. Let me see...oh found it. There it is.

Ok now, see the right upper tip of the "W"? The last star?

Yup.

Now count two stars to the right. There's a small, faded one first, then a strong one, almost at the same spot. Can you see them?

Yeah I can...

Now there's a small one after those two. A bright one, apparently blinking. Do you see it?

Yeah! I can see that one! It's not as bright as the left one but it's blinking hard.

Well, that 's our star. I had it made for us. I called in a favor the Gods owed me. I once gave Zeus a ride home, he lost his wallet so he couldn't grab a cab.

...

Yeah, if you're silent for being shocked at my stupidity, let me tell you I'm a bit surprised myself. But I just thought...it would be fun to count the stars with you...

I love you.

This is too serious. I think we should see other people.

Nice way to ruin it Romeo.

Ehe...I'm messing around. I...I gonna be honest with you...I lied. I don't know Zeus.

Just shut up for a second.

Why?

I just...wanna hear you breathing.

I love you too...

...

But seriously...the "seeing other people" part, Zeus just asked me out...we're supposed to go chase some nymphs...

The silence you're about to hear right now? This is me pouting...

So...that's a "no" on the bitch cruising with Zeus?

Eheh...You're a dork...oh and I should be in bed, so stop wasting money on me and wish me good night.

Dream of me if you can...

Bitch cruising with Zeus?

No...just me.

Okay.

Kiss.

Good night handsome.

*clic*

"I don't look a thing like Jesus but I...talk like a gentleman"

"You're kinda cute" she says, running her hand through my hair.

"You're not so bad yourself" I reply, lighting up the room once more with the warm, red light of one last drag in my cigarette.

All dark again, just her hand in my chest and her warm breath on my neck lets me know she's there.

Her breath turns quieter, she's falling asleep again....

I stare at the dim light, struggling to get in through the window's shutters and listen to the city outside, falling asleep, quietly letting me know it's late. No voices beneath us on the sidewalk, no cars pass by, no dogs bark.

Just silence.

I wonder how many people in this town are falling asleep to the fainted melody of a beautiful girl nodding off on their shoulders...

What have I done to deserve this I wonder. I always believed in karma, yet lately, I have been a fucking prick. I lied, cheated and wronged people in ways a good man shouldn't. Then she shows up and all that regret multiplies by the guilt of feeling so damn good when I'm with her. Why the fuck do I believe in karma...

I feel like I'm driving a car through heavy rain, deafning, hard hitting rain that makes me squint my eyes to try and glimpse at the path ahead through the windshield, steering by instinct, hoping I'm on the right lane.

Then a bridge crosses over the road and, as I'm under it, everything makes sense. The rain now hits the asphalt above me in a soothing, natural symphony. My path becomes clear and I slow down, savouring the peaceful. fleeding moment of the calm before the storm.

She's that bridge. That split second of clarity between storms, that makes you wish that road that's above you would never end.

But it does. No matter how slow I drive, that dreaded rain is coming back, once again, with a crushing sound, preluded by a clichéd expression of the utmost simplicity..."We need to talk."

No...not this time.

I come back to reality, she's stroking my hair, softly, in what seems like a dazed state of relaxation. She lets out a "hey you" in a soft whisper...in my head, loud enough to silence a crowd.

"There's something you should know..." I say, lighting up another cigarette, choosing the words carefully in my head. She looks at me and nods, attentively listenning to every word I'm about to say.

"I'm gonna go out on a limb here and say that you like me." I say, smiling at her, staring at her shocked yet curious expression as the words reach her ears. I take a drag on my cigarette and procceed. "I know this because I've never let myself fall for someone I wasn't sure felt the same way about me...yet my past always finds a way to fuck things over...so I want you to know something..."

And I tell her.

Like a catholic man talking to a priest in confession, I let out my mistakes...mistakes I believe a girl like her, even though tainted by her own past, running from her own ghosts, won't understand.

The times I didn't cry for people I lost, the times I led girls to believe I was something special, the times I betrayed, cheated and played with people's emotions for my own, personal selfish gain...

I tell her everything. I feel her moving back, away from me as I keep going, her hand no longer holding mine, her presence dimmed...

"I just...wanted you to know...what you got yourself into."

Silence, light's still out, pitch dark in the room.

I feel the bridge above my car, shielding me from the rain, ending. The storm aproaching once more.

Fuck me...why didn't I keep my mouth shut...a few more weeks living a lie seem like such a better choice now.

I feel her moving now, bed's shaking, she's coming closer...her hand in mine once more, she kisses me.

“Each has his past shut in him like the leaves of a book known to him by heart and his friends can only read the title”

"Virginia Woolf..."

"It's what you were that made you who you are...screw the past. We'll make it work."

The bridge above me ends. It stopped raining...

A escuridão de um quarto adormecido perde-se por momentos num rasgo luminoso que anuncia o início de mais um temporal. Por entre as frechas de um estor que há anos que teima em não fechar bem, vejo a chuva que cai, descompassada e agressivamente, procurando o embate barulhento na calçada.

Mais um relâmpago...olho para o lado e vislumbro-te por instantes. Sorrio e acendo um cigarro, trazendo ao quarto a luz incandescente e frágil que irradia, alaranjada, a cada bafo.

"Porquê eu?" perguntaste-me tu, há seis anos, no início de uma complicada relação que lentamente ganhou rumo e se tornou no que somos agora...

Não o disse na altura, mas a resposta seria "Porquê eu...não tu. Tu és um livro a ser escrito que eu todos os dias quero ler, eu sou...um conjunto de revistas que contam estórias com finais infelizes e parágrafos em aberto de decisões que não quis tomar."

"Foi isso que te fez o que hoje és." dirias tu, sorrindo, deixando-me já aí adivinhar esse teu "lado solar". Essa feição que hoje conheço tão bem, de corrigir o que está mal com duas ou três palavras.

Mas não.

Fiquei-me por um "Porque não?"

E como o mais ínfimo bater de asas de uma borboleta altera o rumo de uma vida alheia, não mudaria uma vírgula ao que disse. Pois embora não contendo a entoação romântica da resposta que penso, enquanto olho para ti, a meu lado, deitada, dormindo, iluminada por uma frágil luz incandescente de um cigarro, agora quase extinto, transpareceu o espírito despreocupado e carismático de um gajo que te adora, mas não o mostrou. Convidando-te, assim, subtilmente, a uma busca ainda hoje incessante de respostas como a que escrevo agora, que trazem um sorriso sincero ao teu rosto; expressão que, só por si, ilumina mais que qualquer relâmpago numa noite de temporal.

Short Bloody Story

Standing on the pier, his hands still bloody, his eyes still filled with tears, he glanced at the moon reflected in the quiet sea. The two men were still after him, his running only bought him some time. Running out of options he looked up...this was probably the only time he's ever talked to God.

He quickly glanced forward...he still had around one minute.

He turned his head back up, facing the sky, he smiled and took a deep breath, to gain some courage. He has always denied God's existence, yet he cursed himself for being a victim of the old cliché: turning to God when we have no other choice...when we see life passing by in a flash and death smiling at us behind it.

Truth is he wasn't looking for redemption. He was looking for a way to let out what he was thinking, to shout out his story to the world, one last time.

"Big man, I'm running out of time...so I'm gonna do this quick. I don't believe in you. But I believe in karma. And talking with you somehow calms me down. I need you to know, it was all about her. If all else fails, it was all for her."

He lost himself in his nostalgic thoughts. His eyes stared at the past, a better life he no longer had.

The two dark figures kept moving, now running towards him with the conviction of a predator that was about to finish off the wounded prey...half a minute...

"She meant nothing to them, but I swear, Big Man, to them, I will mean the world. I can still hear her voice screaming after the first stab. I can see her eyes looking at me one last time, and in quiet desperation, accepting there is nothing we can do to stop it..."

His eyes now burning with a hateful passion, he stares at the men coming towards him and smiles.

"Those are the kinds of things that turn a man into a monster"

He wasn't a fighter. He wasn't born into it, he had boxed in years gone by but now he was a lawyer whose life revolved around his job, whose goals were nothing more than a good life: a house, a family, a dog.

The two men on the brink of confrontation with him were hired goons. They had killed and tortured a dozen people in this town. They had street smarts and the endurance a lifetime of physical violence provides. 

They killed her.

They had no chance.

The flood of energy your body gets in a situation where you have the upper hand, numerically and experience-wise, cannot be compared to the adrenaline rush you achieve facing the two men who murdered your daughter in front of you and are about to murder you.

He moved as if God himself had listened to his words and granted him the power to take revenge. It was over quickly.

Both armed with a knife, they came at him stabbing forward in his direction. A quick side dodge to the first direct hit and an inhumanly strong punch to the stomach brought the first guy to his knees, yelling in pain. Holding on to the weapon-wielding arm of the kneeled man, the enraged lawyer twisted it with such fierceness, you could hear the arm cracking under the forced rotation, dropping his knife into the hand of his attacker.

The second guy was a slightly taller, bald, dark man. He yelled in rage as he sliced his knife sideways, hoping to cut off his victim's stomach. The blade sang as it danced through the air, achieving nothing but a sweet, disappointing metallic melody. A melody no enraged attacker wants to hear. Misjudging his victim's reflexes, the man was caught slightly off balance after his herculean effort to cut open the lawyer in his first motion. On a regular day, a regular man would take this opportunity and run. This man didn't. No fear of death would come between him and his revenge. He managed to incapacitate one, he would be able to deal with this one too. Two seconds off balance were more than enough to throw himself forward against the attacker, with the knife near his chest, stabbing the now astonished and agonised predator in his lungs and quickly removing himself from the dying man's last effort at a swing.

The first goon, now slowly recovering, is put in a position you don't wanna be in - kneeling before a daughterless murderer with a knife in his hand. The lawyer screams out loud as he stabs the bleeding knife into that man's neck, ending his life with a scream of rage. His scream turned to a cry. A desperate, saddened cry to a void pier..." Why me?!" is what must be going through his head...I don't know...I can read lips but I can't read minds.

After all this commotion, it almost saddens me to do what I am about to do. Sadness hasn't been a part of my vocabulary in a long time...you develop such resilience, doing what I do, in this kind of situation, you're sometimes left wondering what is it that still keeps you human. Kudos Mr. Lawyer man...or should I say, Mr. John Trent...you almost made me shed a tear. A quick wind calculation to make sure I don't miss my target and the trigger is pressed. 

What some may perceive as a brief moment is, to me, a slow, beautiful ritual I never grow tired of being a part of. The squeezing of the trigger, the bullet sliding through the weapon's barrel and quickly and precisely hitting the desired target's head. The life that vanishes while the eyes of a freshly deceased man stare blankly at the sky. My apologies Mr. Trent...but I had a job to do.

She was moving out that night, to Boston. The check in was in three hours, at around 5pm.

2:10 pm

I called her up, three rings, perfect timing, she picks up.

"You know" I start abruptly "a good friend of mine once told me you can see how much a girl likes you for the number of rings the cell rings before she picks up. One ring means she was anxious, five rings means she doesn't really wanna pick it up but she does. Three rings tells you absolutely nothing. Couldn't you have let it ring a little more...or a little less?"

She laughs, loudly, quickly replying "Well, if I did, I'd be an open book. I like to keep some mistery in what we have."

"Yeah. that would be my next question if I didn't already know you'd avoid it...what do we have?"

"So you wanna go out to lunch? I've got 2 hours to spare."

She changes the subject every fucking time.

"What makes you think I have two hours to spare?"

"I know your shcedule, you have about 4 hours before you go into work."

Sometimes I hate it how well she knows me.

"Well I got other plans. I met someone." I tease.

"Was she tall, skinny and with a beautiful smile like me?"

"No she's ugly. And fat. Her name's Rhonda, but at least she 's not moving to a town that's 5 fucking hours away."

"Well, is 5 hours a price you wouldn't pay to be with me?"

"I wouldn't "pay" 10 minutes. You're lucky you're my neighbour or this thing we have would have ended long ago."

"What do we have exactly?" She asks, laughing.

I sigh, loudly.

"You're a lunatic. I'm downstairs, let's go."

"Coming "dear"!"

Seriously, I hate myself for not being able to stop seeing her. She's not serious about anything in her life. Not even me I guess. And I know I've only been with her for over 3 months now but I still don't get her. All we do is fuck and talk about the weather.

Not the weather exactly but...well, you catch my drift, about meaningless, trivial, mundane shit. I have no idea on what her political, religious, even art views are like.

Is that what turns me on? The "relationship with a stranger" thing? It's literally like being with a hooker, every day, for free...maybe I'm just nuts, but I can't help thinking there's so much more she refuses to share that it makes me wonder: am I the hooker here? The easy lay that asks for nothing in return? Fuck it, it's 2 more hours then I won't see her again.

2:50 pm

"Wow...Kiki's Bistro...that's an original place you're taking me to eat." She rolls her eyes, clearly unimpressed, smiling at me two seconds later, letting me know she was joking.

"Well, I didn't want to impress you to much. Afterall, you're leaving in 2 hours. We wouldn't want you to start enjoying this town, do we? Better be safe and take you to the same old shitty restaurant than to run the risk of seeing you shed a tear when you leave."

She laughs again, caressing my cheek and tilting her head. A classic move that gets me hooked everytime. And she knows it.

"You know I'll miss more than just this town don't you?"

"Honestly? I don't know. You're a closed book... You're lucky I like the cover and the abstract in the back. Or you'd have no shot..."

"Don't flatter yourself Dean, I'd have a shot. You're no Brad fucking Pitt."

"You're no Jessica fucking Alba either..." We start laughing, looking at each other intensely. She bites her lower lip, teasing me. Time to go home and work off this meal.

"I'll get this one" I say, while I ask for the check "Get us a cab, saves us 20 minutes we can use doing something else..." I smile slyly, we both know what I mean.

"Are you sure you can keep up for 20 minutes more?" She whispers in my ear before leaving the restaurant. "Maybe we should just walk..." biting my ear as she finishes off the sentence.

"If I can't, you can mock me on it, it's a win-win situation for you!" I reply back loudly as she's walking off, knowing noone would know what I was talking about but her.

3:50 pm

"It's such a cliché, smoking after sex...I have no idea who started this but now it seems like I just can't stop doing it." She states, taking a deep drag from my half smoked cigarette.

"I know why I do it. Sex gets me excited, cigarettes calm me down. It's the perfect ending to an arousing situation. Like covering up a fire with a wet blanket."

"So you're telling me I'm a fireball in bed?" giggles, while snuggling up under my arm.

"You're no Ice Queen that's for sure. But you clearly don't deserve all the credit." I gloat, kissing her forehead.

An awkward silence follows this brief talk, as if we're trying to freeze frame this momment into our minds. The sun shyly bathing the bedroom through the half openned shutters, warmly reminding us there's still life outside this place, something we forgot about when we're toghether.

Then it starts to come back. Reality. The traffic noise, the people talking below our building as they pass by, the ambulance sirens in the distance, it all starts to slowly gain volume as we're pulled back away from "us" and into the world once again.

"I...I should get going or I'm gonna miss my flight..."

"They wouldn't leave without you. They can't find in this town a tall, skinny girl with a smile as gorgeous as yours to replace you... They might go with Rhonda though. I hear she loves to travel."

We laugh, sadly. These lazy, meaningless yet enchanting afternoons were over and we knew it.

"Hey...I don't want you to take me to the airport."

"Guess I'll just have to take you by force then. Let's face it, you're not strong enough to fight me off on this, better to just let me take you and avoid the whole "me going to jail for kidnapping a woman" drama."

She smiles at me like I've never seen her smile before. Her eyes shining, tilts her head a bit, one of her sexiest tics, licks her lips and says "I wish I didn't have to go..."

I stop. That's the first time her shell comes off. Just when she's about to leave...I don't want this. Not now. I've gotten used to the idea of her being just another girl. This makes it a thousand times harder to say goodbye.

"You know, you really know how to choose the best momments to pour your heart out."

"I do, don't I? I bet Rhonda has better timing than me..." She claims, quickly rubbing her eye with her sleeve and lightly laughing at her own joke, trying to hide the tear I knew was coming.

"I don't know how to tell you this Sarah but..." I try to put on a serious face, but I fail as i finish the sentence. A joyful smile betrays me. "...there is no Rhonda."

We both laugh.

"I'll be right down, can you go ahead and bring the car around? I'm just gonna get my bag from my apartment."

"Don't order me around!" I sarcasticly say as I leave. Sarah laughs.

4:30 pm

"Well, this is it. I can't go past this point with you. Well...I can, but only for some brief seconds untill the security guys catch me." I point at one of the security guards leaning lazily against a pilar. He's overweight and looks like he wouldn't even try to move if I ran past the security check "Well if they're all like that one, we still get a couple of minutes to say goodbye in there."

She smiles and looks away, eyes watering up.

"You know, I hated this town the moment I moved here. I don't know what it is about Chicago...it's a great place, our building by the river has a lovely view but...I didn't like it here. Then I met this guy...this...confident, funny yet immature and kind of lost guy that made me love it here..."

I smile back at her, brush her hair behind her ears and reply "I'd love to meet him someday. He seems interesting." We both faintly laugh, once again.

"You always know what to say..." she comments ironicly, rolling her eyes, smiling and gently pushing me away. I pull her back in and kiss her for the last time. Not a passionate, hot kiss. Just a quick peck on the lips. Goodbyes make me feel depressed so I'd rather not say it or mean it in any way.

"I'll see you tomorrow dear" I say, smiling as I move away, winking at her.

"Don't forget to pick up the kids!" she playfully answers, laughing with tears in her eyes.

Don't look back Dean. Don't look back or you will spend another month trying to forget her.

I don't. I keep walking. Almost mechanicly. I walk past the street, into my car, start it up, punch the steering wheel and yell "FUCK!". Why do the good ones have to leave?

Well for all I know she wasn't one of the good ones. If I rationalize this, I didn't really get to know her. So why do I miss her so fucking much? It's been 3 months Dean, you're a man. Shake it off and lets get back to our life. I gotta be at work in an hour. Better go home, take a shower, start fresh and get my mind off of her.

5:30 pm

I get home and I realise the door is unlocked. It was Sarah who closed it the last time, since I was getting the car around. I go in and look at the desk in the hall. There's an enevelope standing there with a big "Dean" written on it.

Just when I was about to close this whole damn mess behind me...

I open it and read the small letter inside.

"Dean

I know notes are kind of a cowards way of saying things, but I'm a girl, I can afford to be coward every once in a while.

You never got to know me because I thought it would be best to keep things supperficial between us, to avoid getting involved, the sad goodbyes, the end of a relationship...but I was wrong. I fell for you and what I most regret is that you never got to know me...

My last name is Florence, my parents are from Springfield, Illinois, where I was born and raised. My favourite band is the Beatles and that scar on my neck you wanted to know about? When I was 9, I fell down while Ice skating and I hit the wooden boards that limited the ring with my neck.

Also, I hate butterflies. I don't know why, it's a pet peeve of mine...

I wish i could have stayed and tell you all of this and a lot more in person...I really wish you got to know me...but maybe it's better this way...I gotta go now, you're downstairs in the car and I know you don't like to wait.

Love,

Sarah"

11:30 am

I couldn't sleep. No sleep at all. Even on the flight here, where I usually just nod off as soon as the plane takes off and wake up with the flight attendant telling me we arrived, I couldn't sleep.

I look like a 15 year old girl crying because her high school crush doesn't love her back.

Pull yourself toghether Sarah, You start working tomorrow, you gotta undo your bags, get your life in order and move on. He's just a guy.

I hate moving. So much packing and unpacking. Let's hope Boston is the real deal now, I'm getting tired of travelling around this great country of mine looking for a steady place...but then again, nurses are everywhere nowadays...I just hope Boston's Medical Center takes me in for good.

I can't wait to start working just to get my mind off of me and into work mode. That's exactly what I need right now...

He wasn't that great anyways...Dean, what kind of a name is that? Nnoone's named Dean since the 60s...

The doorbell rings, finally the rest of my things arrive. I can start to make this place look a bit like my own, give it some charm.

"Who is it?" I ask through the intercom.

"Who the hell hates butterflies?" he answers.

Message of a Schizophrenic

Dear world,

My name is Tom. Well, it’s Thomas actually, but everyone calls me Tom and I got used to it.
I’m a schizophrenic, currently stopping my medication and going back to my hallucinations and I just wanted you to know why.
I have been coping with my disease for almost 6 years now. Ever since it was diagnosed, I’ve had a pretty normal life in my drugged-up state. I went to college, I found a girl, got myself a job, moved out of my parents’ house, and felt completely empty.
Everyday life, regular purposes, standard living...all of those are overrated.
Take the Amish for example. They live in a completely alternate world, they use no electricity, and they live from what they grow, completely frozen in time, oblivious to technological and social innovations. And they are happy. They register higher happiness levels than people living in most of the major cities, they live in far less stressful conditions, they are, in their own way, a balanced, "happier than you or me" civilization.
Society has evolved into a discriminative, selfish state of mind, in which for one to be considered “happy”, one must be so, in their own, pre-conceived notion of happiness. One must work, struggle through life in hopes of succeeding, reap some of the benefits of his accomplishments and be a little better off.
Buy a better car, get a bigger house, go on an extended vacation, retire, all means to an end: happiness. Be it temporary or long-lasting, we all strive for happiness.
I found it when I was 20 years old.
I remember going to bed at night, falling asleep to the most beautiful songs while staring at the aurora borealis forming up in my ceiling and thinking “I am crazy”.
I was. Hallucinations were constant, not always beautiful, but I managed.
I conversed with people of all colours and shapes. I spoke to dogs, owls, travelled around the world, beneath the sea, to places most of you can’t even imagine. I saw shooting stars at night, slowly fading away into the blackness of space while standing on the moon.
“I am crazy” I kept saying to myself. Now, 6 years later, I know I was...but I was happy.
On some of my “worse nights”, I laughed and smiled more than I did in all of my lucid days combined.
I could be as happy as a kid in Christmas, and as miserable as a wrongfully accused criminal at the night before his execution.
Those are the kind of ups and downs you strive for in a lifetime. The moments that take your breath away and make you rethink who you are, are ignited by the type of feelings I had every night.
So why should I have to go through the so-called “normal” process of living in order to achieve and marvel at the wonders, travels and people life throws at you at a steady pace, when I can enjoy it all, fast, brutal and hassle-free?

So fuck you and your medicine. I’m off to live more in one year of my life than you will in 60.
I’m crazy, I’m happy, I’m sad, I’m depressed, scared, ecstatic, tired...all in one day.
Can you beat that?

Sincerely yours,

Tom. Thomas

Letter

Hey there,

It’s been a long time since I wrote a letter to anyone...much less one in english...but knowing you can’t understand it leaves me soothed. Someone else will have to translate it for you. Find the words that elude me in my language, find the feeling of hopelessness in his words to describe me, as best as they can. And they will fail. And in failing, you will understand this letter means more than the eloquent words written in it, it means you and me and where this is going.
It’s been 25 long years of hardships, wrongful turns propelled by fate or destiny or maybe just blind stupidity, mellowed out by those around me, keeping me on track when I feel like just crashing out of the rails.
I’m not an easy person, I’m stubborn, spoiled and the sense of responsability still eludes me every once in a while, yet I feel like I will be okay. As one of my best friends once said to me “We’ll be fine, because we have to.”
But in this crazy little journey, you and I got lost in separate ways. Our tracks kept parting ways and we did nothing to stop it. You got your life, I got mine, we’re both adults...yet lately, more and more I can’t seem to find the will to visit you, to spend time with you. You’re not the same person you were when we met. I was a lot younger back then, you had me hooked on every word you said, you passed on your beliefs to me and for some of them, I thank you.
You made me a better person, no doubt about it.
And in doing so, you somewhere got lost in your own ways, selfish that I am I didn’t pull you back, I failed to realise you needed someone there to lead you back on track like you’ve done for me countless times. I gave up on you. As much as I hate to admit it, I did.
Now you’re lost somewhere in your illusion of a better life and I can hardly recognise you. You lost your fire, your passion, what made you so damn heroic. You live shelled out of your real self, haunted by what you used to be.
You are hardly the same.
I don’t think of you half as much as I used to...and ten times less than I should...
But then again, neither do you...
We’re even.
Maybe someday we’ll pick up where we left off.

We were once a great team.

“Se não nos virmos antes, até depois.”

Telefona-me

"Se hoje queres saltar,

 Eu quero ser razão"

Num rasgo de coragem, incentivado pela minha quarta bebida, peço-lhe o número para depois lhe ligar.

Chama-se Maria, vive no Porto mas está cá durante 3 meses a fazer o estágio para a ordem dos advogados. 

Quando a pergunta termina, a palavra "número" paira no ar pelo que me parece uma eternidade. 

Neste caso, o dilatar do tempo deve-se ao facto de a Maria ser linda. De olhos verdes, cabelo escuro e dentes incrívelmente brancos que contrastam com o baton preto quando se ri, como o faz agora, não sei se de mim ou para mim, mas tira da mala uma caneta e puxa-me pela mão.

"Vais-me levar onde?" pergunta ela, enquanto escreve os números na palma da minha mão. 

"Não é para mim. É para uma amiga minha que te achou gira." olha-me mais uma vez e finge-se surpresa, de boca aberta.

"Essa piada custou-te um número" responde, sorriso sempre nos lábios enquanto escreve oito dos nove dígitos, desenhando um ponto de interrogação no último algarismo.

Já não me lembro de como foi o encontro, nem sei se me lembro realmente da Maria, mas acho que nunca me esquecerei dos 6 telefonemas que fiz para sair com ela.

E que o último dígito era o 5. 

Fuck you Lisbon

"I'm all lost in the supermarket

 I can no longer shop happily
 I came in here for a special offer
 A guaranteed personality"

September comes in and it's already taking its toll, leaving a heartbroken Dan in a half-cleaned room on a Saturday night.
The last of my free wingmen got hitched with this beautiful girl who's way above his league.
I know it won't last, but who am I to deny or criticise a freshly started relationship between Alex and another one of his future ex-girlfriends, when the expression "Really hot" isn't enough to describe her - and despite her intellectual shortcomings (who doesn't know who Murakami is?...) - still ends up way above average in the "looks + brains" equation.
And so this is how this "summer ride" ends...my last carefree Saturday, spent at home, wondering how packed might the clubs be.
You are a cruel mistress Lisbon.
Incredibly enticing yet completely forbidden to a guy with no single friends left and no high-end connections to end the night in any classy joint.
It's a "love-hate" relationship between me and this town...and it's bordering on "hate" right now.
Fuck all of you who are out tonight clubbing.

Breaking up

"Maybe I'm Blind, maybe I'm blind, oh... I couldn't see you shine" true words that have never been spoken.

"I love you" she says...
"I gotta go..." I reluctantly answer, turning deaf ears to what she said...
I do love her but I think she's fooling herself...drowning herself in the desperate attempt of something real with someone like me.
I know what I deserve...and it's not her. Why should she waste a leap of faith on a degenerate man who's still a child inside...growing up only when the words "Poker" and "Drinking" resound in his ears.
No...if I do love her...I can't say it back.
She looks away from me and tries to disguise a brokenhearted face...
Her rapid descent from "fairy tale land", where princesses exist and happy endings never grow old, takes its toll on her usually high-spirited mood. Her red lips disguise the shocking call to reality with a vague smile, yet her eyes betray her in the most beautiful of ways: they shine ever so brightly, from the reflection of the morning sun on a concealed tear, watering up, waiting for me to leave, to water down...
I hate myself sometimes.
"Will you come by later?" she asks.
"I might..." I know I would. I would come by to once again say what needed to be said. To say those four little words no one in a committed relationship wants to hear: "we have to talk". And talk we would.
I would say I'm sorry...I didn't mean to fool her with promises of a future spent together...I wasn't boyfriend material. I would say we had our fun...
I would tell her she's far too perfect for someone as broken as me. She deserves her prince charming, her candlelight dinners, her perfect wedding...
She wouldn't listen. She would yell back at me for being with her for five months without ever mentioning my reluctance to try and have a happy life.
I'd agree.
I'd let her hate me. It's easier for her to get over me if she does.
And I'd leave.
Off to find someone else who I'd eventually deem far too beautiful to be with me...

Short Introduction

This is me...

A 24 year old guy with a nack for romanticizing life, making up stories as I go along.

Which of them are real, which of them are fragments of my bored imagination trying to come up with something that resembles a real life situation or feeling, it's up for you to judge.

Judge away and enjoy the reading.