I’m unravelling.
The separate pieces of my mind no longer whisper—they scream, each one tugging in a different direction.
I ask the mirror for answers it never had the decency to learn.
A note—creased and crumple-worn—falls from my jacket pocket like a ghost too tired to haunt.
I run my thumb across the ink, smudged but still cruel in its clarity.
Somewhere beyond the silence, someone begins to strum a guitar, the melody raw and familiar, like the ache of memory.
My thoughts form a jumble too dense to untangle, yet too fragile to ignore.
Love, it turns out, is antithetical to survival when your heart’s been set on fire.

Author’s Note:
This piece was stitched together using a patchwork of prompts from FOWC, RDP, 3TC #MM103, SoCS, and the Writer’s Workshop. I tend to write like I’m walking barefoot through glass—deliberate, a little reckless, and always bleeding something honest. If it stings, good. That means it’s real.