we both know we're never gonna make it

He calls me, and I pick up the line. He asks how I'm doing. I say I'm fine.

I want to say, why are you talking to me, across the miles? Why are you asking after me? I want to say, you broke my heart, can't you let me be?

I ask him how he is. He says he's fine. He asks what I'm doing.

I want to say, why do you care? You threw me away, that wasn't enough? Now you invade my thoughts and ask me questions, and why am I still important to you, if I wasn't important enough to keep?

I tell him. Involved in this. Involved in that. The usual, I say.

Photography, building. Parties, dancing. I've filled a life and no section of it belongs to him anymore. He has no tie to me, no call to me, I have no reason to seek him out. Yet he speaks to me.

The conversation trails to a halt. He doesn't have much to say these days.

And I remember when we spoke for hours, saying everything, saying nothing, just being together, talking, each to each...he was my heart and soul and all my dreaming, and...now even the memories are dust...

I wait, each time he calls. I wait if he has more to say. I wait and see if I have words to say to him.

Words like, "Goodbye." Words like, "Never speak to me again." Words like, "I will not listen if you call, do not try."

But no. He remains on my contacts, to contact me. Haunt of my past, and never to be free of him. Even the dead version of his soul is still on my list.

Silver-haired idiot.