imaginary beings

my best friend is scared of spiders. i don't know if that is relevant or not. he doesn't shriek anymore, but he definitely doesn't care to be close to them.
when we were 17, i went to his house one afternoon to visit him - i was home from college for a week, he was still in high school. i always wore the same outfit when i visited him, at least when it was chilly - a black lace skirt with a skin-colored liner, knee high black socks, and a red and tan striped shirt. i still wear the skirt sometimes, it fits me better now than it did then. i don't remember the exact content of the visit, i'm not sure what we talked about. i'm not even sure of the date, but i think it was the middle of october. i do, however, remember the climax, and the sudden panic when we realized his mother had walked in upstairs. i remember that much.
it is hard to define the relationship he and i have, because it is so old.
it is hard to remember where i end and he begins, at times.
it is hard to imagine me without him.

I cannot hold back the walls when they close in but I think I can slow
them
down enough to see you go
from fire to smoke and rise.