Segment of a Piece Submitted to an Anthology Based on Encounters.

Crooked Souls That night we met on the Osborne Street Bridge, a common host to our tte--ttes. The ice below was thick, as January always promised. The wind sawed deep into our bones, exposed lips grew chapped while our worn mitts proved too thin for our tremulous fingers. Our frigid bodies were a mere casualty of the night; we always remained a greater danger to each other than the sub-zero temperature. Standing at the peak of the bridge, 4 A.M.s haze clouded my psyche while I combed my mind for conversation tools. I had nothing but slander to speak. We often plummeted into bouts of silence in each others presence. Our bodies would demobilize and eyes would lock; they revealed a hunger for the other more murderous than romantic. There were frequent overwhelming urges to push him over the railing, watch his weak body flail, drown, and disappear forever. I couldnt decide whether I wanted his lifeless body forgotten in a burlap sack or condensed within a mason jar; a souvenir of what was. Tonight wasnt the night, I wanted to get lost, feel majestic, and give into temptation for a while longer. We roamed the streets with no concept of yesterday or tomorrow; our spirits relished in each others company. We passed the window of his workplace that I once smashed with juvenile belligerence; we retraced the alleys that housed our intimate interactions, the pavement that supported our outstretched limbs and adjacent heads. We wandered until the plummeting temperature became unbearable. Our stubbornselves were lit and too alive to separate so we let our feet lead us to the bus shack. It remained an unspoken rule that we wouldnt let each other into our homes for fear of what would happen in the privacy of four walls. I forced him to feel like a criminal scaling the building of my character, catching only glimpses of me through the windows; he was only allowed to peer in from the outside. If I opened my door, he would be in my sheets, my mind; he would be on the inside looking outmy flesh crawled at the thought.

Our relationship mimicked a valiant fear that I only felt as a child; that feeling of suspense as parents gave you to the count of three. I fell hard between the milliseconds of one and two; the pause after two was enigmatic. We never reached three. It took years to comprehend that he meant nothing to me while, in an era of indignant lust, our encounters meant everything.