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Love Is... (Long But I Hope Worth Reading)


Riverspell

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Sitting here in my chilled room, clutching my quilted blanket, I stare at the pictures littering my wall. Outside my room is the usual sounds of daily activity and the distant sound of rain splattering on my window. Rain is good after all the heat this week and I tug the blanket around my shoulders instead of getting up to close the window. I hate the sun for a number of reasons. Always have.
And of course the clouds would be non existent this week.
I'm still staring at the wall when mom hollers at me. She's at my door when I look up and I suppose I appear a bit scattered because she stares at me with that funny head tilt of hers. The dishes are dry again and it's time to put them away. Before I move, though, she tells me I have a couple hours before Chris comes home and shuts the door as she leaves. We have our differences, mom and I, but we seem to always know what the other needs. And, right now, mom knows I need space.
I go back to the pictures and carefully run my finger along a few. Some are smooth and thin but some are thick and others torn. As unique as the memories they capture. When my hand drops it brushes the stack of yet to be placed photos and the boxes beside them. My hand freezes of its own volition and I stare down at the glossy rectangles.
Something tickles my insides and I smile a bit in rare welcome. My reply may or may not be spoken but it matters little.
"Hullo, Bob," my voice feels empty, "Wondered when you might show up. What with you disliking sniffling and kleenex."
His reply is as miffed as he can make it. "Could be Jane."
I snort and bluntly inform him that he's the one that comes when I'm distressed. Only a shrug is given in answer before he sits back against the wall at my feet. Carefully I push the old shoe box at him. The biggest box of photos and the one I have yet to search through completely. He pushes it open while it stays shut in my reality. It matters little, I see the truth and no one else matters.
He's oddly careful when he reaches into the box my sister's compiled for me. They're photos they could scrounge out of the purple bin in dad's basement. One's we're not sure he'd let me have but they know I need them. Most of them are just random moments, sometimes planned shots, and all of them rare. My mom loved taking photos but as prints have always been expensive and our moves so frequent, not many survive.
They're for my memory wall. Photos tacked along the small portion of plaster beside my bed. Laying in bed the last few nights, however, I've considered covering my whole wall so that I don't have to be so selective in my choices. Bob seems to agree with this thought as he presents a photo I obviously skipped over.
"Any reason you tossed him back?" He's practically shoved it in my face and I take the solid copy from my box.
My brother grins up in yet another generic sitting room setting. He's wearing one of his favorite shirts as a kid and reaching up at the camera. His face is split wide in that genuine grin he lost as he grew older. There's no other clues to the situation. Just a small boy captured mercifully in time.
I shrug in response as I place it back. "It didn't fit. Not good enough."
His eyes narrow. "Are you sure it's not good enough? How is a genuine smile not good enough from a kid who lost his joy before he could walk?"
"Since when were you my counselor and mind reader?"
Bob grins a bit and taps a long finger against my forehead. "I'm in here, remember? Yeah, I'm real and all but that doesn't mean I'm not part of your head."
Can "ghost" fingers really be this cold? "Fine, you're in there but that doesn't mean you know everything."
"Your brother was born in 1994 and was pegged from the beginning as mentally handicapped kid incapable of a decent future. He hated life before he was ten and I know you haven't forgotten all the times you held him as he begged you to tell him why he wasn't wanted."
"So?" I demand harshly.
"So, you took care of him like you did the rest. But you weren't the only one who saw life as a pile of crap. This wall shouldn't just be your happy memories," he's pressing that photo back into my hand, "He's happy here. What's not fitting about that?"
This time I take it and look closer. Looking at it I'm sure this wasn't long after I showed him how to walk. I'm sure he's showing off here with the predictable sloppy grin of his. Bob's hand rests on my knee a moment so I glance up at him.
"What's that lesson your counselor wanted you to do? The one you refused because you don't do it like everyone else?"
I'm uncomfortable, I know where this is going, but I answer anyway. "Love. He wanted to know what love is, to describe it. Thought it'd help for some reason."
"Can you tell me what love is?"
My groan doesn't dissuade him.
"I'm real to you but that doesn't mean I have everything you do. My personality is mine but my emotions are often yours. Tell me what love is, if only to satisfy my curiosity."
"What's the point of this? Why are you even bringing this up?"
This time his words are accompanied by a picture. "Think of it in simple terms. Like this, start with "love is" and go from there. Use the picture if it helps."
I'm glaring at him uncomfortably. "You aren't going to drop this, are you?"
"Have you ever known me to?"
"Fine."
This time I find the solid photo he's holding and I look at it and try to figure out what to say. It's a picture of one of our backyards with the grass so tall you almost can't see us running through it. I'm not sure who took it but I recognize the scene easily enough. We're chasing crickets and beetles in the summer time heat. You can see the sun gleaming on the tall, fading grass stalks. For a moment I can almost hear our laughter before Bob is gently pressing at my knee again.
I look at him and swallow hard as I answer, "Love is.....Love is chasing crickets in the heat of a summer afternoon."
Another photo. This time it's a pair and they're as different as they are the same. One is our craft table covered in paint and clay and a small part of my sisters head where the clay is hanging from her hair. In the other we're using sticks to draw in the mud and dumping different powders to try and make it pretty. Now there's a bit of a grin on my face.
"Love is play dough and paint and mud on the wall."
This time it's an image of the bedroom my sisters and I shared in one house. Our mattress and bunched up blankets with the pile of boxes in the corner. Just as messy as it always was and just as terrifying.
"Why are we doing this?" My voice is barely more than a whisper.
Bob just watches me for a moment before he replies. "You told me once that love is part of what makes something good. Said that even when somethings shitty there can be good in it if there's love alongside. Maybe if you see the love in these pictures, you'll use more than you chose and have more to be reminded of. After all, didn't you tell me that love is a powerful thing? No matter it's shape or form?"
I just nod so he continues.
"These pictures, the ones you've kept. They're all your good memories but what about your sisters'? Your brother? Don't you think having their happy memories up here might help too? At least then you'll know your love counted for something."
This time when he shows me a picture I don't even blink. Even if it's not something I had a part in. I just answer.
"Love is chicken noodle and teddy bears."
Mom always made soup when we were sick. She even managed it when she was "sick". Most of the time. Sometimes she'd find a new stuffy for you or she'd just wash your usual friend so they smelled good when you cuddled them. Tea and soup and blankets were the order that day.
His finger lifts my chin and I'm only a bit aware that my eyes are itchy. "You aren't the only one to love either. Love is yours too."
My smile is weak but he accepts it as he pushes the shoe box between us.
Love is something incredibly hard to describe and understand. This short story is true, it happened only just last week. Bob is one of my usual crew who was more of a belligerent phantom than a supportive voice of reason. In a way I feel he represents my bipolar through his personality, reactions and basic behavior. What he said is true, that he's very real to both myself and himself but that, though this is so, he is still very much a part of me. He doesn't understand, doesn't truly know what love is. So his desire for me to describe it any way I could was as much for him as it was for me. Like Joe, he is privy to what happens with my doctors (though I'm sure the others know the basics) and I remember now how he hated it when I skipped out on the emotion exercises. Preferring instead to bottle it all down. I think, here, that he was trying to get me to understand a lesson that I've long tried to ignore and still hardly grasp at. That love can be shown in an infinite variety of ways and that as much as I've shown love to others so to have they to me. A person may have been the devil to you but that does not mean that they did not also hold love in their heart for you. I've got plenty of proof of that in my own regard and I need to start remembering that. I think it will help me to heal and move on in the end. So, below, I've made a list of what "love is" and shared what I did with Bob. Maybe you'll find some use for it.
- Love is setting the stove on fire. (Tea makes the world go 'round.)
- Love is braving the deep end. (Brother is obviously not a fish.)
- Love is trying something first. (Mom's wrong, Brussel Sprouts don't taste like sweet corn.)
- Love is showing it's ok to cry. (Cry now, I'll help you beat the kid later.)
- Love is learning more about band aids. (It may not be a tree next time.)
- Love is impromptu song and dance routines. (Because they need help and your the oldest.)
- Love is is books and paper and sauce pan hats. (Why is it always pirates?)
- Love is blanket forts and pillow fights. (Captain, we need more duct tape.)
- Love is surviving a water slide. (Just because you're terrified of water doesn't mean she has to be.)
- Love is a swing set at sunset. (She's too tired to push herself.)
- Love is hiding bottles. (They've seen them but they don't need to know what they're for.)
- Love is paper sacks and quarters. (A sandwich is good but candy is better.)
- Love is expeditions and treasure hunts. (Don't forget where you hid the jar this time.)
- Love is glitter and glue-sticks. (Hide the evidence before mom wakes up.)
- Love is being hit and taking the blame. (It's not their fault they've held on to a child's curiosity and poor sense of self preservation.)
- Love is a genuine hug. (You know it's a good day.)
- Love is hot cookies and milk and laughter. (It's a really good day.)
- Love is carrying. (Whether it's the backpack or the person.)
- Love is doing what you can't. (They've gotta provide somehow.)
- Love is midnight snowballs. (Next time don't wake them up for the snow.)
- Love is cheating at trick or treat. (She's sick so bowl robbing can't be so bad.)
- Love is hills and trails and berry bushes. (A family outing is such a wonderful thing.)
- Love is slugs and slimy things. (Slugs numb nettle stings.)
Love is selfless.
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  • 2 weeks later...

that's really good btw

i have people inside my head that i cant get away from

so your not the only one going through scary moments to

sometimes they make me laugh

but most of the time i wish they wernt there.

thanks for explaining the picks for me instead of uploading them like other people do

it really gave me a picture of your life

you explain things really well as well

as a blind person i'd like to compliment you on that. :D

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