Another Girl's Paradise
you caught me lingering
in another girl's
paradise
the way she paints
the world --
I want that in my
life
-"Another Girl's Paradise," Tori Amos
I wonder what it is about love that makes the spring smell sweeter? The flowers bloom brighter, the sakura petals dancing in sunlit wind become a validation of a dream rather than part of the season. Every smile is stronger and purer when you're in love in the spring. I can see that on your face as you're walking by with him, gibbering on happily about something or other that fails to reach my deaf ears. Deaf because you're far away from me, or deaf because I simply do not want to hear. Or maybe deaf because I am not you. Your prim blue suit dress that touches just above the knee, your legs smooth and slender, not much different from my own. Your hair pinned back by a plain, silver barette that catches the sunlight and glints at me, a warning as it blinds my sensitive eyes. I wince, angered momentarily by the way the light bounces off of you and hurts me. Your smile is neverending, and I wonder how it is anyone could ever have a smile like that. A smile for everyone, for every day, stronger and purer than the sum of all my parts.
What is even more painful to see, is the way he smiles. Smiling back at you, bright and true. A smile that I've never seen and that he has never dared to show me. A smile that I have spent sleepless nights over, imagining and fantasizing as I looked up into the darkness and agonized over why that smile wasn't there to put light into my life. Why does he smile at you like that, and yet has never afforded me anything close to a smile? Wasn't I the one he sought out in the night and took without warning, the one he wanted and couldn't wait to have? He cannot even embrace you. He cannot even speak the truth to you, whereas I know every truth he has. Do you know how he does anything I ask? Do you know how bruising his fingers are when they're digging into your hips? Do you know how release is the greatest thing he craves, because he has lived his entire life with control and no excuse for release? Where can he find release with you, when to touch you would mean to lose you?
It makes me smile to myself, my face half hidden behind the silk sleeve of my robe. Leaning over the edge of the window watching you two like this gives me the sense of superiority I should have, considering I'm the one with all the power. But why is it I feel so helpless when he nods at you, agreeing with what you're saying as you stop and turn to him, your hands making elaborate and descriptive motions in the air. His eyes are riveted to your face, staring at you with more softness and more attention than he's ever stared at me. There's always a vague distractedness to the way he looks at me, the way he touches me, something fleeting in his eyes as his mind wanders. Who does he think of when he's with me? Shigure, Ayame? Since you have come, does he think of you when he is with me?
You laugh suddenly, your laughter ringing clear to my ears, echoing up and out and making the birds scatter in a flutter of wings and loosened pink petals. Feathers and petals fall like snow around me, some falling with the slightest kiss of silk or velvet against the back of my right hand, and if I close my eyes for a moment I can see his face and feel his lips in the brush of the petals.
When I open my eyes I see that he has noticed me. You stop talking and are quiet as you examine his face, then slowly you turn and look up, noticing me as well. You both look on, silent and stonefaced. I see something like fear in your eyes. In his eyes . . . nothing.
Why does he love you . . . and not me?
I narrow my eyes as I lock my gaze on yours, your dark eyes wide as a deer and begging for forgiveness.
I will never forgive you. You don't deserve him. You don't have what it takes to love him.
I stand up and step back from the window, back into the shadows where life has deemed I stay. Out of your sight, out of his.
Does it all come down to
the thing one girl fears
in the night
is another
girl's
paradise
-"Another Girl's Paradise," Tori Amos