THE ANT HILL

I am in love with a man and our love spans over a long time but it is as if time skips. At first we find love for each other and beam with happiness. Then it skips to contentment, as we embrace it makes us feel safe.

He always wears his one shirt, a favourite of his, a crisp white shirt with blue strips. It makes his tall frame look a little too skinny, elongating his thin face topped with shortly cropped light brown hair. He’s much taller than I am, when I hug him, my face only comes up to his chest.

Time skips again and I am sitting on his right as he sits at the end of a long meeting table. There are others with us, seated along the other chairs but they are merely outlines, no faces but yet I feel all their eager and hopefull energies. A voice comes on the speaker phone and confirms my lover’s achievement of his life’s desire. We are all joyfull and celebratory while he sits there, head leaning back against his chair, contemplating his win.

I take his face in my hands and hold it close to mine, but he’s still contemplating, he doesn’t see me, his gaze looking past me. As I let go I realise. I realise that I’m a ghost. A ghost in love with the living. I think back to our moments together. I realise. When I hugged him lovingly, he does not hug back. I realise. When I looked at him he doesn’t look back at me, but past me. I realise.

And as I do so, the world before me dissolves as my heart breaks, leaving a black nothingness. I return to my own ghostly reality and submit to my fate to walk alone, forever in love with the living.