Ms Brightside and I.

I watched that girl suck back her tears when she thought nobody was looking. I memorised her heartbeat and the flicker of her eye lashes when she blinked. Her scent of flowery moisturiser and daisy perfume or sometimes coconut body lotion and a soft scented perfume that I could never quite match to a certain smell, and occasionally, vanilla moisturiser and an overly sweet perfume, these smells of her, mixed with cigarette smoke, were all imbedded into my brain.
Glazed eyes, staring out to space, seeing stars and love scenes and death scenes, and they all featured her like she was her very own number one celebrity, but eyes never seeing what was really there, a mind incapable of fathoming something as dull as a textbook, or a white board, so she created her own scenery, sitting up on cloud three hundred and eighty four, all by herself, but she seemed happier up there, as opposed to in the real world where her brain would surely melt. I saw her bone white face with cheeks too red, the colour of wilting roses, and lips the colour of blood, red that was closer to orange than pink; eyes heavy with mascara, trying to hide sadness and solitude, but mostly trying to conceal the vancy that whispered of a mind that was never in it's place.
Her touch felt like hypothermia on my skin, which had a constant habut of being fire hot; I had never realised that I was made of fire until I fell in love with a girl made of snow. She melted away in my hands the second I got too close, so we had to touch through a glass coffee table.
Her writing ould drive a saint insane, and even after all this time, it still takes all my work to untangle those strange letters, curled together, promising secrets:
,i>I love you. Do you love me too?
Of course I loved her, but I couldn't tell her that, so I sat back and pretended that I had never read that goddamn pissant note. Love ruins everything, everyone; I watched her love tear her apart, to shreds, and heard her sob mindlessly at 3am after her had drank too much vodka, and smoked too many cigarettes then washed all of her feelings down with cheap white wine.
"You're just drunk," I told her. "You have to sleep." But she couldn't sleep. Her insides were eating themselves; too much love that couldn't get free. So I held her, and let her tears wash down my neck, and I ached for her, and her strange, doll-like beauty. Such a small face, so round with it's huge blue eyes, and freakish skin, and cheeks that had spent too much time in the wind, and freckles that hid under acne scars, and why did she have to be so fucking beautiful?
But she was still crying, and so was I, because it hurt me for her to be so alone. I wanted to tell her that I loved her, but she scared me with her pretty face, and girly smell, and cigarette lungs, all that fucking alcohol in her blood, brain, heart.
We were lying in her bed, and her bedroom with its purple walls, green furniture and hardwood floors made me feel safe. It smelt like all of her scents mixed together and the cinnamon candles she constantly had burning, and the alcohol on her breath/ All around us were books that she could crawl away and hide in when she couldn't handle reality anymore, and her wonderland in her brain started to make her sad. Empty vodka bottles held roses, and I hoped that they weren't from some other admirer that she was bound to have, but God knows she never seemed to pay any attention to them anyway.
I know I go on about tiny details, things that will seem unimportant to you, but what you must understand is they are the pinnacle of what I am, and I never want to forget any of them, even after she was gone.
She listened to Blink 182 and Two Door Cinema Club, and The XX, and it all just made her sob even more; but it made her look as pure as sin, with her mascara tracking down her face. It was too cold for Summer, and it thundered. It occurred to me that she was drunk. Of course, I already knew that, but now, in the dark, all I could smell was her vodka, cigarettes and wine. Forget her smells, the smells I loved. She was making me angry, and I couldn't bear to be near her anymore.
So I walked out the door to her balcony, risking being dry. I knew I would go back to her, as I inevitably always would. Her stupid fucking cigarettes and the little blue lighter were sitting on her glass table. So I sat down, and smoked.
It disgusted me, but I did it anyway, and even now, I haven't had a cigarette since. I can't smoke without thinking of her. So I smoked, and I thought of her best friend. They were as delusional as each other, two girls who wore their pretty masks so they could never be found. But her best friend, with her dark tan, and high cheek bones and thin face only made me ache for the sad girl, lying drunk in bed, waiting for me to return to her.

So I did.

I know I make you sick. Please don't leave me. I need you.

And I cried with her some more, our tears mingling, bitter like she was. I reached out and held her hand, underneath the sheets, and all that alcohol made her forget she was made of snow for a little while. For the night, we were both made of fire. I longed for her to be made of all the same things as I. She was too smart for her own good, read too many books, drank too much as was so pretty she was ugly. But when it came down to it, she was always going to be snow, and yes, I do love you. I love you I love you I love you.
So, I held her hand, and kept her warm, and when she had drifted off to be alone with the fairytale in her head, I told her.