Title: Words for a Summer Storm
Author: Zanthra 
Word count: 208 

 
Here I am, using your paper on such a night as tonight. I decided I couldn’t sleep- just too quiet without 
your presence here. You have that effect… I can’t say I fault you for it, but the truth is, I do. On some 
subconscious level. It was the same one that made me fall in love with you. 

So here I am now, writing away on this half-eaten notebook in our dinky room. Away from the lights and 
the people and the sounds. I can’t believe you’re gone… And I don’t know what to do when you return. I 
hate you for that, just like I hate you for your attitude or I hate you for your social grace and the beauty that 
goes with it. I was never adept around people- my major flaw. It’s nothing big in the long run, not if you’re 
here to do the talking…  

I hope you will be. 

To write what you know is what’s taught. I know that your quilt is tattered and fraying around the edges. I 
know your pillow smells like you and your shampoo- autumn rain and cranberries. I know you don’t like to 
make your bed before you’ve gotten dressed and have fixed your hair. I know that I’m lonely without you. 
It’s hard to know and not object; to tell the truth is a well-deserved brutality. The curtains are grey with use 
and threadbare; A mist of rain is falling down on the buildings stretching as far as the eye can see. 
It isn’t fair for me to love you and for you to know so little…  

It isn’t good for me to know so much.