Stand By

On the run home, my phone dies. I stop somewhere in Chelsea, a puddle of sweat and the August sun setting mildly across the Hudson, trying without success to encourage it at least to get me home. New York at the end of summer is a strange scene any year, but this year it has changed its palette entirely. The apartment across the street is still empty, my roommate says I think he's the one and cannot believe her own words, the world is still full of wonder. I wake in a cold sweat with dreams of my phone exploding and melting onto my hand, my lips whispering fuck as I come to. I find an old phone and fire it up, find pictures from another life, reminders of who I was and for once it doesn't cut through my thin plaster. We are surviving the end of the world, you don't think I can handle a little heartache? New smiles appear at the opposite end of the table, old friends move a thousand miles, we are surviving the end of the world,

you don't think we can get through the start
of a new one?