Round...15 years?

Dying ain't so bad. Cold, but kinda warm at the same time? Indescribable.

They lied to us in our classes for sure, though. Hearing isn't the last thing I lost, it was my sight. Mizi above me, she looked like she was grieving.

Grieving me?

I think not too long ago, I would have celebrated this even in death. I would have worshiped the sight of her tears baring themselves to the world in my honor. Now I'm not so sure, because the love I was so determined to drown in no longer had her name engraved on every molecule.

There wasn't a name anymore, rather a face. A sensation. One I'm too ashamed to describe.

My vision began to fade, black bubbling through like the blood from my neck. This is good-bye.

Good-bye to the people I loved, and even to the people I hated. I hope that when I wake up as a babe, the cruel cruel god will put me into a different universe where I'm not burdened with the consequences of not singing loud enough, bright enough. Where I can live, free of monsters whipping my back as though I'm a jester for a king.

But then again, this so-called God is heartless, the devil with an ivory robe.

Ah.

Bright lights.

I'm awake.

----------

In this life, me and the man who took three bullets so I wouldn't have to take one for just a second longer didn't meet for a grueling amount of time. 15 years, to be exact. I couldn't forget him. I couldn't forget that face.

He doesn't look too different. It's funny, he's almost identical. A little taller; maybe a little stronger, but that soul? Ohh, that soul. I'd recognize that soul from anywhere.

I don't think he remembers me. Not like I remember him. Not like my pencil remembers him. Not like the pond at Anakt garden remembers him.

He'd constantly badger me about my drawings, usually of poppy flowers or the occasional rose, or my childish crush. I think I drew her the most. It was shallow, the emotions I felt for her. So very shallow.

Sometimes though, I would draw Ivan.

Ivan.

I would draw him more than I'd like to admit. Much much more. He'd bother me so much, and when the papers I burdened with my soul were filled, he wasn't there to count how many stars I couldn't even fit into his graphite eyes.

It's odd, he followed me like a dog everywhere, even when I hit and abandoned him. He would free me from my restraints and smile when I slapped him for it. But look at me now.

Finding him in the next life like a beaten fucking puppy.

It feels like something out of a novel, right as I had given up on finding anyone from Anakt Garden when I walked into my first freshman class and saw those eyes. Empty onyx with a tinge of burgundy. Unforgettable.

We got close after that. I'd like to say I understood his feelings, his lips screaming silently onto mine. I didn't, though. I really didn't understand him like I thought I did.

Not until his own shallow feelings forced themselves up on me again. It was the end of a school day; the skies were orange and purple as the moon beckoned for the sun to sleep. I was finishing up my band practice when he grabbed me and pushed me against the wall. I knew what was going to happen. I knew I was going to hate myself for not resisting like I did 15 years ago.

I knew I would hate the feel of his skin on mine, painfully warm beneath my palms- a reminder. His lips begged to consume me in violent love. It was not a kiss, but rather what felt like an explosion: teeth clashing, breaths being stolen from one another, the taste of iron from our lips and the smell of salt from our bodies was overwhelmingly thick between us. Nails carved words we couldn't say into shoulders, hands pressed bruises into hips as though it were my neck, and still we embraced, a desperate knot of limbs and longing that neither of us dared murmur to each other.

And I was right. Every touch was a reminder, every caress a punch. His whispered confessions -the susurrus of love against my throat, Words meant to romance burned like the purest of hatred even as I shuddered beneath them. I hated him. I hated this cruel punishment of reincarnation. To be honest though, I hated myself most of all.

For loving every moment.