The Ultimate Vampire Resource and Directory

I have loved you on your darkest days.
I have loved you on my hands and knees with my fingers dug into the cold, shattered earth.
I have loved you in the bright sunlight and under the last sliver of the pale, silver moon.
I have loved you at 12:37 in the afternoon and at 2:18 in the early morning.
I have loved you in the pouring rain.
I have loved you as lightning lit up the dark side of my soul.
I have loved you in a room with all glass walls and a dark blue roof and in a pale room with no windows at all.
I have loved you 6000 feet in the air and 6000 feet apart.
I have loved you in the deepest recesses of a painful memory that exists only in your mind.
I have loved you on your darkest days.
I have loved you with a bright smile and bloodstained teeth.
I have loved you covered in bright colors and lights and I have loved you in a dark bedroom with cold sheets.
I have loved you for every second, every minute, every hour.
I have loved you in every color, every light, every place.
I have loved you with pale eyes and cold hands and bright smiles and painful words and dark hair and goodbyes and hellos and every word in between.
I have loved you on your darkest days.
I have loved you from a bright computer screen at 3 am and from the tinted windows of a grey car.
I have loved you from oceans and mountains and skies too far away for us to even comprehend.
I have loved you from the depths of a soul that is cold and hard and filled with hatred.
I have loved you on your darkest days and on the days you can’t stop smiling.
I have loved your tears and your arms and every freckle painted across your skin.
I have loved you with every painful thought, every cold word, every funny story, every hello, every goodbye, every phrase passed from my lips to yours and back.
I have loved you on your darkest days and I have asked nothing from you in return but I am asking something of you now.
If those days and nights meant anything to you.
If the rain and the lightning and the glass walls and the pale moon and the cold sheets ever meant a single thing to you, I am begging you now.
If you ever feel like telling me that you love me again…
If you ever want to come back to me…
If you ever miss the home you had in my arms…
If you ever want to stare up at the pale moon again…
If you ever want to love me just one last time… please…don’t.

The universe that I belong in is the one where you and I were 2 sides of the same coin.
The one where we shared secrets and love.
The one where I always knew that you would be there to catch me when I felt like letting myself fall.
I want to live in the universe where I can see your eyes clearly on sunlit mornings.
I want to live in the universe where you love me and I love you and there are no walls or barriers between us.
And I hate the worlds where you or I do not exist.
Where the smile I reserve just for you never sees the light of day.
Where your grin never quite reaches your eyes.
We started as 2 very different people.
I hated yellow and dreamed of revenge.
You loved yellow and longed for somewhere to call home.
We almost walked right past each other and never realized it.
We almost passed each other in a busy market on a Sunday afternoon and never knew what we were missing.
I almost never loved you.
And even after we met, we argued.
You threw your worst at me and I hit you with everything I had.
I hated you.
You hated me.
But as the ground froze beneath our feet, things started to change.
You were a girl with long brown hair and broken eyes and I was a girl with black jeans and clenched fists.
You loved yellow and I hated it.
Your yellow umbrella never shielded me from the pouring rain.
As the ground began to thaw again, I watched flowers bloom in your eyes.
And you watched the stars sparkle in mine as I looked at you.
We fell apart and then we fell back together all over again.
I learned to love yellow and you looked at me like I was home.
Sometimes we looked at each other the way they do in fairytales.
Sometimes our love was strong enough to withstand the world.
I love these lifetimes in which we find each other.
But I hate the ones where one of us does not exist.
Where I wait for you in a place with no light.
You and me are 2 sides of the same coin.
That's how I know that you'll come back someday.
Because I'm still here.
Still in the pouring rain.
Still waiting for you and your bright yellow umbrella to finally bring me home.

You’ve gotten worse. Not all at once, it’s been a gradual process. A slow but steady collapse. You’re living in a space suspended in breathtaking pain but you dismantle yourself in a way that gracefully distracts me from the fact that I am watching shattered pieces fall from your smile. I feigned oblivion to begin with. I didn’t know how to fix you when I couldn’t even fix myself. But your hip bones are more prominent than I have ever remembered them being and even as I press my lips to the scars on your wrists, I can’t stop thinking about the ones on your hips that will never fade. I ignored the warning signs for so long. I ignored when your ribs pressed into my chest as I held you against me. I ignored how the scars had spread up and across your stomach. I ignored how you pushed me away when I tried to press my lips to your wrists but I couldn’t keep living a lie. I can’t remember the last time I heard you laughing. I can’t picture your smile anymore. Because you never put your heart on the line. Not for me and maybe not for anyone else either. You always told me that you can’t break a heart you can’t find. But I broke yours anyway.
I love you. I’m so sorry. And I don’t even know what exactly I’m apologizing for. Much less if I’m apologizing to myself or to you but at the same time, that doesn’t seem to matter. All that matters is I can’t fix this. I am 17 years old and I am so incredibly scared. I’m scared of the ghosts in your head that leave marks and the ones that don’t. I’m scared that no one is here to tell me everything is going to be alright. I wouldn’t believe them anyway.
You see, there was no one thing that led our relationship to a screeching halt so much as it was a gradual process that paralleled your falling apart. It was a process aided by distance and excuses and years of deep seated self-loathing.
I called my father for advice. He told me that I needed to take care of myself before I could ever take care of another. He told me that I wasn’t Atlas. That I couldn’t hold the heavens on my shoulders just to keep them from crashing down against your fragile soul. My father isn’t a writer but he taught me to live off of words ever since I was old enough to understand. My mother ended the conversation. Telling me to leave you. That she never did like the sound of you to begin with. I’m starting to agree.
Because I can see every rib straining out against your skin and I can’t help but wonder what I would find in the spaces between them.
What I said to you was “I can’t do this.” What I meant was that I can’t do this with you.
What I said was “this hurts too much”. What I meant was that you were hurting me too much.
I wanted to explain to you that I used to believe everything would get better if I just gave you time. If I waited for you. I can’t find the words to tell you that you’re broken and that I’m just not enough to put you back together. I wasn’t even enough to stop you from tearing yourself apart to begin with.
But I never needed those words. You could read them in my eyes because they’re the same color as the sky was above you as your father collapsed on your 10th birthday. And the tears on my eyelashes are the same as the rain drops that clung to the black varnish of your father’s coffin when they lowered him into the ground almost a week later.
You have come to learn the colors of abandonment and even though you know that you’ve built this house yourself out of the dark wood of your own mahogany skin and the red roof tiles of your lips, the red rimming of my eyes doesn’t hurt any less because it’s the exact same shade as the match that you held in your hand. The match that burned your fingers. The match that you threw onto a pile of worn photographs. The match that burned your house to the ground.
You didn’t cry. You pulled me into your arms and as I buried my face in your hair, I thought of stained glass windows. How the images are so beautiful when the sun strikes them that people forget the windows are made up of shattered pieces of what once was. I couldn’t help but think how every brush of your fingers against me felt like a familiar taste of poison.
8 months later I had found someone knew. She was the kind of person whose emotional baggage could fit in a carryon. She was easy to understand, and though she played her emotions close to her chest, she always let me know what was going on in her head. She didn’t have quicksilver moods, and her emotions never changed at the drop of a hat. The spaces between her straight, white teeth were not filled with an incurable sadness.
Three months into our relationship, and I still couldn’t quite get over the ease with which she fit into my life. There were no more nights spent tossing and turning, wondering if the girl I woke up beside would be real, or merely a ghost of the one I went to sleep with.
She was the kind of girl who understood. So when my phone rang around two in the morning one day near the end of our junior year, she watched my expression change from confusion to concern to anger and finally to nothing at all. She understood when I sat still for a moment before the words “I need to go” passed my lips. She understood that I wasn’t coming back. She understood that I was sorry but that my heart still belonged to you. She understood that even as you fell apart I wanted to hold you tight enough to pull all your shattered pieces back together. She understood that I would never love another in the way I loved you. And she loved me for it. She loved me. And I loved you. And you deserved so much more than what you got. But then again… so did I.

Sometimes I write because I’m tired of screaming. Because my voice is raspy and painful and it hurts just to think about having to explain myself one more time. Sometimes I write because I am tired of listening to you explain all the ways that you could fix me. All the ways that you could make me better. Maybe me good.
Sometimes I write so that the voices in my head can quiet down enough for my to finally get some sleep.
Sometimes I listen to music to drown out your cruel words. To avoid hearing you tell me how broken I am and that if I were a little stronger, you might love me. Sometimes I listen to music so I don’t have to hear that the abuse my parents fling at each other like arcs of water in the pool on a summer afternoon.
Sometimes I listen to music to drown out the angry voices that ring in my head from afternoons that passed 8 years ago.
Sometimes it’s not enough. Sometimes I write until my pages are soaked with tears and my throat hurts and my chest feel almost too tight to breathe. Sometimes I listen to music under everything else drowns in the bass and I can’t hear your voice anymore. Sometimes it’s not enough. Sometimes your eyes are burned into my mind too deep for me to reach and I don’t know how to stop feeling your hands against me.
Sometimes it’s not enough and it’s way too much all at the same time and I’m lying on the beach underneath the waves staring up at the sun and breathing in the cold water. Sometimes I can’t breathe at all.
Sometimes I miss you and sometimes I hate you and sometimes I love you and sometimes I can’t feel anything at all.
Sometimes your hands push into my chest from a world far away from here and memories that I haven’t pushed down far enough. Sometimes I can hear you say that you love me and sometimes I even believe you. But sometimes I don’t. Sometimes I️ love you and sometimes I️ hate you. Sometimes everything hurts and sometimes I️ can’t feel anything at all. Sometimes it feels like drowning. Sometimes I️ miss you. But then I️ remember what you did to me. And suddenly I’m numb all over again.

It's funny because you always wanted me to tell you my secrets. You wanted my entire heart and soul. You wanted to know me inside and out. Every thought in my head. Every word that passed my lips. You wanted me to trust you. And I told you that I would only entrust my secrets to you once I knew that you would hold them safely. That made you angry. And you left me. Proving that once again, people only want your secrets when they're easy to receive. Proving that I was right in not trusting you. Proving that you are the exact person you claimed to hate. Proving that your promise means nothing and I meant even less. I wouldn't say that I regret caring about you. But I do know that if I could go back to the day that our eyes met across the room, I would have left before you had the chance to say hello. And I won't come crawling back to you. I'm just not that type. I won't forgive you. Wont forget what you've done. Because you were always the perfect liar. Skilled at making me believe I meant more to you than I ever truly did. Or maybe you did love me. Maybe you did care in the way that you swore you did. Maybe your definition of love is sick and twisted and broken. Or maybe I've been blind to all the red flags. Because your name used to hold the very stars in the sky. Now it just sounds like a broken prayer sent to a god who long ago stopped listening.
The biggest problem that you and I ran into was that I had so many problems and so much pain that needed to be cared for and you just told me to cover it up and hope it goes away. I guess I should have run when I had the chance. But you were kind and selfless and beautiful and I wanted to believe that someone so perfect could actually care about me. I was desperate for a love that no one could give me. And I was willing to take your pathetic excuse for love if it meant that I could sleep at night knowing that someone cared whether or not I woke up in the morning. As it turns out, someone did care. It just wasn't you. And I don't mean to sound angry, cold, or bitter. But that's what I am, so that's what comes out. And I wish that could be the end. That I could move on from you the way you have already forgotten the sound of my voice but sometimes I look at you and it hurts. It hurts somewhere deep inside my chest. It aches and it burns to know that you have heard secrets that you are not worthy of. It hurts to know that you swore on your life to stand by my side no matter what life threw at me and then the moment we left clear waters, you were gone. And I was alone again. And you have the audacity to tell me that I should trust more. That I should let people in. How dare you tell me how to live my life when all you're done is break people. And humiliate them. And turn them into monsters they can't recognize in the mirror. How dare you. I wish I could hate you. I want to hate you. But hate has never been something that I'm good at and I know that if you apologized to me right now, I would tell you it was fine without a moment's hesitation. But I would never trust you again. Because pain can be forgiven but never forgotten. And I won't forget the day that you told me I wasn't worth it. You denied it later. Even a moment after the words left you lips, you were rushing to explain that it really wasn't what you meant. That I misunderstood. But the damage has been done. Congratulations. You've been added to the list of people who's names leave a bitter taste in my mouth. All the way down at the bottom, when everyone has long since stopped listening.

You and I were never designed to last.
Twin water signs with matching blue eyes and hearts deep enough to drown each other. You and I were doomed from the start. Long blonde hair against dark pillows and tan skin that faded like the stars. The numbers just never added up. 17 years old, having already missed our chance at happily ever after. Each the youngest of 3, cursed to never be anything more than a shadow of those better than us. You were never a saint and I loved you in every shade of wrong. We were doomed from the start. Four blue eyes. 10 fingers grasping too tightly. I watched you leave out of the corner of my eye and the fire in your gaze burned bright enough for me to look away.
You and I were doomed from the start. You were never a saint and I don't know how to love. Matching eyes and matching lies. You and I could never last. I never saw you coming and I'll never be the same. We're 18 now and whatever's left of my heart is still made of gold. You moved 6000 miles away from me and it still wasn't far enough. The headlights on your dark walls will always whisper my name and you'll never be the same.
I was never a saint and you loved too hard. We lived in a state of suspended loss. The stakes were high and we were always alone. I guess we only wanted a love that was torture.
I wrote to forget you. You drank to forget me. I drove too fast on dark highways. You left the pain miles away.
You and I were never designed to last. Twin water signs with matching blue eyes and hearts deep enough to drown each other. We paid the price, you and I. 6000 miles and still too close. I'll never be free. The chains will always dig into your wrists. I was never a saint and you love too much. Our love was a ruthless game with a predetermined winner and neither of us ever learned how to play. My reputation's tarnished and you gave no explanation. I loved you recklessly but you never knew who I was. You were never sure if the girl you woke up beside would be nothing but a ghost of the one you went to sleep beside. You made me fearless. And I made you careful. Neither of us were ever quite ourselves together. Twin water signs with matching blue eyes and hearts too shallow for the kind of love we needed. Our love was a ruthless game and neither of us ever quite won.
Maybe you and I will find in each other. In a world universes away from here. A world where twin water signs and matching blue eyes could meet in the middle of a war zone and find a way to be brand new. A place where we can fall apart like puzzle pieces and find homes within each other. A world where our relationship could have lasted the test of time. Maybe someday we'll meet in a world like that. But for now, all we have is this. And this was awful. And ridiculous. And desperate. And thrilling. And when the dust finally settled, it was something I’d never take back.

Isn't it ironic that our love is as ancient as a thousand lifetimes and yet we couldn't spend even one together? Isn't it ironic that I've known you in lifetime after lifetime and yet we've never gotten our happily ever after. Doesn't that make you angry? That I've loved you for so many years but never been allowed to call you mine. That I've lost you time and time again and yet now, when we could finally be happy, I can't stand the thought of loving you? Because you aren't the same soul that I've loved for so long. Your heart is different. Your mind is different. You are not the true love that I have known for centuries. You are not her. Not him. Not right. But I am still in love with you. Who you were before. Who you might have been again if you hadn't poisoned your own body in a miserable attempt to finally be happy without me. The sad truth is that I'm in love with a girl who doesn't even exist in this lifetime. But god I wish you did. I wish you were still the selfless and beautiful soul that shone in the darkest times. I wish you were the same heart that I loved in countries I've never been to and deep in oceans that terrify me now. I wish you were still him. Still her. Still here. Still right. I wish I could love you now. I wish that this lifetime could be the one where we finally find our happy ending. But I can't even stand looking into your eyes. Because you are not him. You are not her. You are not right. I don't love who you are today. I don't love who you are in this life. I cannot love you. You and I are going to have to wait for another lifetime to finally fall back together. Unless you can change your soul. Unless you can fall on your knees and ask a god who doesn't exist for a second chance at a love that neither of us truly deserve. Our love is as ancient as the fairytales they base off of it but you and I are not destined to fall in love in this lifetime. I am in love with a girl who doesn't exist. With a soul that's been broken by horrible pain. With a heart that's been lost at sea. Forgotten in a country that my eyes have never seen. Buried in a lifetime years past. You and I are meant to fall in love. But not here. Not now. And maybe not together.

You’ve always been an unusual child. That’s what he used to say to her. You’ve always been an unusual child. A little ahead of your age. A little ahead of the times. A little bit too aware for your own good. An a little bit too surrounded by pain to truly be happy. He always knew her better than she knew herself. It was a little scary sometimes. He knew what she was thinking just by looking into her blue eyes and somehow, even when she wasn’t talking- he could hear her.
She used to run to him. When the screams of her parents grew too loud for her to sleep. When her heart felt like it wasn’t beating even when she could feel it beneath her fingers. When the urge to see what lay beneath her pale white wrists entered her mind and wouldn’t leave. She would slip out of her window and head for his house at a dead run. She would be there in 10 minutes or less. Tears covering her cheeks and heart bursting. But it was okay. Because she needed him. He was her safe haven. She would rap her knuckles against the dark blue front door and he would come. Sleepy eyes and messy hair. Cautious and worried. He would pull her into his arms and remind her of all the reasons that she was his unusual little girl. And somehow unusual sounded like a blessing coming from his mouth. It sounded holy. It sounded right and safe. That’s what he was to her. Right and safe.
He was good. And kind. Her knight in shining armor. Her savior. Her best friend. Her soul mate. He was everything that she wanted and everything that she never knew she needed. And he wasn’t perfect. Somewhere in the back of her mind she knew that he was dangerous. And that what he was doing was wrong. But she had always been a little bit too selfless for her own good and a little bit too good at being in pain. And she wasn’t willing to give up her safe space just to truly be safe. After all, she was a very unusual little girl. A little bit ahead of her age. A little bit ahead of the times. And a little bit too surrounded by pain to ever be truly happy.

We’ve been falling out of love for months. You’re drifting away and I’m fading into nothing and I don’t know how to save us. It’s heartbreaking and tragic and I want to love you more than I’ve ever wanted anything before. But you’re in too much pain and I can’t even fix myself. I know this feeling. I know what’s happening. I’ve seen it so many times before. The guarded expression. The cold sheets. The quiet rooms. We never fought. We never grew angry. Maybe we should have. Maybe if we had talked, we could have been saved. But we shrouded our pain in silence and darkness and feigned ignorance and we never acknowledged the hatred that was building up in both our hearts. That was our undoing. You can only suppress pain for so long before it bubbles over and becomes impossible to hide. We’ve been falling out of love for months and I’m almost ready to give up. Because I hardly know who you are and I’ve never known who I am. I miss who you pretended to be when when we were together and I miss the feeling in my chest when your eyes would meet mine. And it’s funny that I’m still here. Still living in this town that you used to know like the back of your hand. Driving down the same roads that you took on your way home from school and the stop lights you watched shimmer late at night. I’m still passing the houses that you pointed out to me whenever our future was mentioned. I’m still here. Still living in the town that’s been grey and silent since you left. Still here. Still alone. Still missing you.

See I️ think the reason that I️ fell in love with you is because you didn’t need me to save you. You were your very own knight in shining armor. You forged your sword from the lies others told and built your castle out of the bricks they threw through the windows of your soul. You didn’t need a savior because you were your own hero. And I️ fell in love with that bravery. That beautiful independence. I’ve been told for years that I’m insincere so I need you to tell me what you need to hear because I️ don’t know what to say to a hero. I’ve never met one before. I’m a mess and I’m lost and I️ don’t know how to depend on myself anymore than I️ know how to depend on others. I️ don’t know how to let people in and I’ve learned how to lie to myself well enough to sleep at night. I️ don’t know how to talk to you without breaking down and begging you to rescue me from myself because when I’m truly honest with myself, it’s obvious that I’m afraid. And I’m angry. And I️ hold deep seated grudges against those who have wronged me and I’m distrustful and suspicious of anyone who tries to love me. I’m moody and bitter and constantly self-centered. And I’m afraid that if I️ talk to you, you’ll be able to read in my eyes that I’ve been lying for the last 9 years every time someone asks if I’m okay. But at the same time, I️ know I’m not hopeless. Because underneath the suspicion is undying loyalty and a desire to make other’s lives better. And underneath the anger and fear, there’s still a little girl who wants to believe that the word is a good place. And no matter how many years pass and how many versions of Hell I️ have to fight myself through, that little girl will never leave me. I️ still want to love you. And if you’ll have me, I’ll spend every day of the rest of my ever-shortening life showing you how beautiful I️ can be. I️ won’t give up on you. And if you give me a reason to live, I️ won’t give up on myself either. I️ know it isn’t much, but I️ give you my soul and implore you to treat it better than the countless faces in my past.

I️ wonder if you miss me. And by that I️ mean I️ wonder if I️ meant enough to you for my absence to leave that same mark on your soul that yours does on mine. I️ left town this morning. 3 am on the highway with the city lights shining against the tears on my cheeks and I️ miss you. 2 pm just leaving school and the girl shouting across the parking lot sounds just like you and I️ miss you. 12:30 pm strolling through town with my hand wrapped in someone else’s but it doesn’t feel quite like yours and I️ miss you. I’m falling in love with you all over again but at the very same time I’m falling apart because you left without a backwards glance and now I’m second guessing every word I️ ever said to you. Because if you felt what I️ did, how could you have left? It’s 3:59 in the morning now. Monday’s were your favorite day of the week. You always used to joke that the beginning of the week meant more times you got to see me. I️ guess I️ thought you were being serious. I️ hope you know that I️ almost call you everyday. And I️ have to fight against myself because if you really wanted to hear from me, you could have called by now. You probably think I️ either moved on or I️ hate you. But I️ bet it never occurred to you that I️ can’t call you. Can’t hear your voice. Your laugh. I️ can’t risk falling back in love with you because you’ll leave me again. And I️ won’t be able to heal from that. I️ wonder if this. All of this. The pain and the tears and the love and the light and the laughter were all just collateral damage in your plan to trap me within your arms and hold tight until I stopped struggling. And maybe there’s something about the pain that calls to me but I️ still miss you. It’s 7:36 in the morning and I’m 7000 feet in the air and it feels like I️ left a piece of me back in Orinda. Even 6000 miles away from you and I️ still can’t wash your fingerprints from my skin. 6000 miles away from you and I’m still nothing but collateral damage in your grand scheme to make yourself feel wanted. I️ wish you loved me the same way I️ love you. I️ wish I️ didn’t miss you anymore. I️ wish I️ meant more to you than collateral damage. But I️ guess that neither of us are going to get what we want. I️ just hope that someday.... somehow.... I’ll learn to be okay with that.

Your mother is angry. She is loud and possessive and always correct even when the lies that spew from her mouth would be funny if they didn’t hurt so much.
Your mother commands attention when she enters a room and you watch yourself wilt beneath her attention in the bathroom mirror.
Your father is silent. He is a ghost in the halls that echo of a child’s laughter now long forgotten. He is the creaking of the floorboards and the whispers late at night.
Your father is shrinking. You can see it in his once strong shoulders and his ever curving spine.
Your mother is in the habit of demanding more than you have to offer. Of requiring perfection where there is none to be found.
Your father hardly ever speaks these days. He comes home later and later. Sometimes he doesn’t come home at all.
Your mother controls your life how. She tells you when to speak and how to think. You used to fight back by scribbling your rage in a black notebook. But you learned your lesson the day you watched as your beloved notebook went up in flames.
Your fathers hair is graying faster than you are growing. The light in his office is always off.
Your mother forgets things now. Simple things like where you are and more important things like why she ever loved you.
You’ve always found it funny when people compare you to your parents. But you can see the truth in their words. They point out your defined jaw line. Your blue eyes. The same curls that have followed your family for generations. And you wish that was where the resemblance ended. But that would be a lie. You do look just like your mother. You carry her angry eyes. You see yourself in her fury. But you also look just like your father. You carry his wilting shoulders. You see yourself in his tired eyes. You hear you own voice, raised to a shout in their arguments.
You can’t ever tell if your parents detest each other or if they are in love. It has all looked the same for so many years.
And you didn’t begin to distance yourself from them because you didn’t love them. You left because the longer you listened to their angry shouts and their hopeless sighs, the less you loved yourself.
Your father doesn’t smile anymore. Neither does your mother.
You are the war. The border between two countries. The dead zone where no one dares tread. You are the collateral damage of a loveless marriage. You are the unspoken words and the angry outbursts. You are the space between them in bed and the silence at the dinner table. You are the paradox that splits them apart but holds them together too tightly for either of them to truly be happy.