abreuvoir

Just gonna stand there and watch me burn
But that's alright because I like the way it hurts.
Just gonna stand there and hear me cry
But that's alright because I love the way you lie
I love the way you lie...

I tossed and turned in the night. Like every night, every waking nightmare, but this one was real. This one was real.

I can't tell you what it really is
I can only tell you what it feels like
And right now it's a steel knife in my windpipe
I can't breathe but I still fight while I can fight
As long as the wrong feels right it's like I'm in flight
High off of love, drunk from my hate

I am five again, small and insignificant. I want to scoop up the girl in front of me, so fragile and unprotected, but she will never grow if I do not let it happen to her. I watch her walk down the dark hallway, and I want to take her hand but I can't. I can do nothing and I am alone and powerless.

I want to tell her that some day it will end, but I can taste the fear that I once felt and it chokes my voice under layers of wool, hides it behind the knot in her stomach. She is me, and I am her, and in this Hell there is no way out but through for both of us and so I follow her down this hall knowing what waits at the other end for both of us. Knowing that I will have to give her to the monster that sits in the room at the end to get out. To get us both out. Knowing that there is no man in six color desert camo to carry us out of here, for us to curse in Russian as he pretends to play the hero.

He was a hallucination of a younger, weaker mind. A dream. A figment. To survive this, she...I...we...must be strong. We must hate him, we must protect ourselves in our anger and fear.

It's like I'm huffing pain and I love it the more I suffer, I suffocate
And right before I'm about to drown, she resuscitates me
She fucking hates me and I love it.
Wait! Where you going?
"I'm leaving you"
No you ain't. Come back we're running right back.
Here we go again

He stands before us, the monster. He offers her candy, and she doesn't know any better, but I slap her hands away from him. I stand between them. I will not let him take her that easily. We made it down the hallway, but in this twisted fairytale of our lives, this is only the beginning.

"You love me, Yulienka. Why must you act like this?"

Because I love me more. I must love me more. I must.

It's so insane cause when it's going good, it's going great
I'm Superman with the wind at his back, she's Lois Lane
But when it's bad it's awful, I feel so ashamed I snapped
Who's that dude? I don't even know his name
I laid hands on her, I'll never stoop so low again
I guess I don't know my own strength

I watch him touch her. Kiss her. She's young. She's vulnerable. She does not know, does not understand. She will hate me for this. I hate me for this, but this is our only way out. I have to sacrifice her, to save me. I can't save her.

Why do I have to choose? Good, evil. They're the same thing. Yesterday, tomorrow. Here, there. I gave her up to him, and I hate her. She hates me. I hate me. It makes me strong.

Just gonna stand there and watch me burn
But that's alright because I like the way it hurts.
Just gonna stand there and hear me cry
But that's alright because I love the way you lie
I love the way you lie...

Hell made me strong. Hell made her weak. Prices are paid for everything.

You ever love somebody so much you can barely breathe
When you're with 'em
You meet and neither one of you even know what hit 'em
Got that warm fuzzy feeling
Yeah, them chills you used to get 'em
Now you're getting fucking sick of looking at 'em
You swore you'd never hit 'em; never do nothing to hurt 'em
Now you're in each other's face spewing venom in your words when you spit them
You push pull each other's hair, scratch claw hit 'em
Throw 'em down pin 'em
So lost in the moments when you're in them

It wasn't enough. He gave me back her broken body, and told me to carry it up the stairs. They never end. And so I have climbed. For years. Burning. Searing. Every muscle hurts. I would throw her out the window, but she's all I have left. She's me. I am her. I want to leave her behind. I am so tired of this burden. I hate. I hate her. I hate him. I do not want this. I never wanted any of this.

I never asked for this.

Let this cup pass from me.

It's the rage that took over it controls you both
So they say you're best to go your separate ways
Guess if they don't know you 'cause today that was yesterday
Yesterday is over, it's a different day

I have stopped. I can't continue.

Sound like broken records playing over but you promised her
Next time you show restraint
You don't get another chance
Life is no Nintendo game
But you lied again
Now you get to watch her leave out the window
Guess that's why they call it window pane

There was a choice. It could have been different. I didn't have to serve this time in Hell. I could have been someone else. I could have saved her. But I didn't. Why didn't I? Why didn't I?

Just gonna stand there and watch me burn
But that's alright because I like the way it hurts.
Just gonna stand there and hear me cry
But that's alright because I love the way you lie
I love the way you lie...

I think about all the things we did together, all the picnics in the park, all the Christmasses. All the times he came and saved me from another weekend at school. All the times he played the knight in shining armor.

All the nights I was anywhere but there.

Now I know we said things, did things that we didn't mean
And we fall back into the same patterns, same routine
But your temper's just as bad as mine is
You're the same as me
But when it comes to love you're just as blinded
Baby, please come back
It wasn't you, baby it was me

I don't have the strength to keep climbing. I don't know how I did it. I can hear his voice, telling me I'll never make it. Telling me I can't save her. I will save her. I will save myself. We will escape. Foot. Over foot. Step. By step. Stair. Next stair. He wants me to climb back down. He promises he won't ever touch her again.

I don't believe him.

Maybe our relationship isn't as crazy as it seems
Maybe that's what happens when a tornado meets a volcano

I will kill him if I have to face him again.

All I know is I love you too much to walk away though
Come inside, pick up your bags off the sidewalk
Don't you hear sincerity in my voice when I talk
I told you this is my fault
Look me in the eyeball
Next time I'm pissed, I'll aim my fist at the drywall

I can't kill him, it would be like killing myself.

Next time. There won't be no next time
I apologize even though I know its lies
I'm tired of the games I just want her back
I know I'm a liar
If she ever tries to fucking leave again...

I have to save her. And so I climb. I have to save myself.

Im'a tie her to the bed and set this house on fire

My name blazes in the wall as he laughs. "Well done, child. I didn't think you had it in you."

Just gonna stand there and watch me burn
But that's alright because I like the way it hurts.
Just gonna stand there and hear me cry
But that's alright because I love the way you lie
I love the way you lie.
I love the way you lie.

1.

Could we pretend that airplanes
In the night sky like shooting stars
I could really use a wish right now
Wish right now...
Wish right now... -- B.o.B. (ft. Hayley Williams & Eminem), "Airplanes"

I know what it's like to want to leave my body. I knew what it was like to force my mind into two places before. Before this. Before magic. It's not a special power, it's not a gift. I knew what it felt like to have my skin crawl before I ever saw the inside of Hell, and I knew Hell long before I knew what it would mean to my soul.

Your parents are supposed to love you.

Boarding school. Being left with relatives. Speaking three languages and not knowing how to ask for help in any of them. Secrets. Our family looked so good from the outside. Perfect. I loved my father, desperately. But they traveled and I was young, and someone had to take care of me. And that's one of the privileges of being as large and Russian as our family. There's always an uncle who can live just down the way from school to watch over you on the weekend or when school is on holiday.

You don't mind if I smoke, do you? I didn't think you would.

They still don't know. My family. No one does. I don't talk about it. It's my secret. There's no reason for anyone else to ever have to find out. It doesn't have to wreck anyone else's life. It doesn't have to be anyone else's problem. Someday he'll die, and then it won't be my problem any more either.

You think I should get therapy? Why, so I can be another broken little rich girl? So everyone in the world can think it's their business and feel sorry for me? I don't need that. There's no reason to open a chapter in a book that everyone's read and pretend it's original. No one wants a beautiful tragic girl with a story like this. Not really. It makes me broken and dirty, and they just salivate over it and then...then they find reasons to hate me. To find me disgusting. I become something for them to hate. There's no reason to feed that monster, is there?

Ok, let's pretend like this never happened...
Like I never used to runaway into the blackness
Now let's pretend like it was all-good
Like I didn't live staring in a notebook
Like I did the things I probably knew I should
But I didn't have neighbors that's why they call it hood
Now lets pretend like I ain't got a name... -- B.o.B. (ft. Hayley Williams & Eminem), "Airplanes"