if the heavens ever did speak; saedis

[sleaze]

I’ll worship like a dog at the shrine of your lies tell you my sins so you can sharpen your knife He knows worlds that could not have possibly existed, but ones he still dreams of. He remembers – or dreams – when he was plastic and in a strange world, cradled in strange hands. He was hurt in that world, and loved there. Made and remade. A name, carved on his stomach. Pictures painted over scars. She loves us. It had been impossible then, that world, and it was impossible now. But it haunts him, those memories, they come fragmented in dreams or when he lets his thoughts drift. He is not a stable boy, had never been, and his experiences keep fracturing him (too many worlds, too many selves). He tries to focus and breathe. To be here, now. To listen to birds and the hushed chatter of the river and smell the flowers blooming around them. To pretend this is the only world he’s known. She is a contrast. She is light, unburdened in the starlight. He does not presume to know her – she is a stranger – but he tastes envy in his throat at the easy way she moves. She smiles. He tries to smile, too, a quiver of the lips. “Hello, Saedis,” he says. A curious name, foreign, but it suits her. “My name is Sleaze,” he says, then, “I’m sorry if I disturbed you.” sleaze cancer x garbage