my balloon wrangler

[ljgeoff]

I couldn't sleep last night. I kept thinking of the shop, if I should open it anyway, if I should keep trying. I quoted numbers again and again to Mike, patient fellow. Each time I'd get to the end, I'd say, "I just can't keep going. I would, if I could."

He'd hug me and say, "I know."

"I don't want you to leave," I muttered. I felt stupid and weak. And afraid of being lonely. "I miss Len." With my head on his arm, I could just see his chin and the outline of his mouth. "I don't hate him." I twirled one of my newly short curls around my finger and thought of endings and of Vanye sawing through his braid.

"Yes. You're weird that way."

"Joe says that if I lived in a bigger city, I wouldn't be so alone. He says that I'm brilliant, but I think that I'm just odd."

He kissed me on the temple. "You are brilliantly odd."

That made me laugh. I rolled and threw my leg over his hips and swept my fingertips across his face. "How do you do this? How do people do it? Stay on the path. I feel so ... so ... So many things have been cut loose. I feel like a Macy's balloon with only half of its balloon wranglers. I'm going to ... to..."

"Bounce into a skyscraper?"

I raised up on my elbow so I could see his eyes. "How do you do it? How do you stay on the path?" And I didn't mean just him, I meant everyone, everyone; how?

"Perhaps our spirits aren't quite as free."

My elbow slipped underneath me and I buried my face in his armpit, my words mumbled against his skin. "Or as odd."

"That, too."

Comments

[johnpalmer.livejournal.com]

Well, you can't be brilliant without being a bit odd, because brilliant people are out of the norm.

If you were in a bigger city, there'd be other brilliant people, and other odd people, and the occasional brilliant and odd person like yourself, and they'd probably be easier to find, if you were the kind of person who can seek such people out.

[ljgeoff.livejournal.com]

just so you know, this makes me want to hug you... damn time/space