The kindest hands leave the darkest marks.

Trigger warning for mention of death and suicide.

The internet suggested I watch Michael Lee's "Pass On" tonight and I almost clicked it. I hovered over the small and unassuming thumbnail with every intent of watching it, and probably crying.

I didn't.

Instead I spent half an hour replaying our first kiss over and over in my head like somehow if I thought about it long enough, it would make me smile.

Instead it just made me think of how when I kissed you, the chair rocked back, and how three months later it was that chair you sat in while you cried and told me you had left me alone in the cabin two hours ago to kill yourself and the only thing that brought you back was that you'd forgotten to feed the dog, and you weren't sure that I would remember.

There are nights when cold air makes me think of you and I, and the edge of a lake that couldn't quite stop being frozen. I think of the stars and the window of your truck rolled down and how somehow you made an extra six weeks in a frigid wasteland seem like a vacation.

And then there are nights when I can't sleep and I do almost nothing but think of all the nights you couldn't sleep and all the cigarettes we smoked, and all the ones we wanted too but couldn't because we were too damn broke to buy bread. Somehow we always had to empty the ashtrays, even when we didn't fill our stomachs.

It was almost a year ago when you brought me home and your truck broke down and your dog fought me while I picked him up so he didn't burn his paws on the new asphalt they were putting down in the parking lot. He'd caught your scent and all he wanted was to find you again. The other day I caught the scent of the cologne you hid in my laundry bag before we left even though I hadn't sprayed it for six months and all I wanted to do was find you again.

Sometimes I wonder if you tell your new girlfriend that your mouth is full of worms and that the only reason you don't die is because the puppy with the golden eyes is waiting for you. I wonder if she understands better than I did. I wonder if she is the reason you don't die now instead.

I'm still convinced that someday I will hear news that says you've killed yourself.

Maybe then I'll go find the bottle of thunderstom cologne, and play "Pass On" and close my eyes and remember the first time we kissed. Maybe then I'll smile.

Maybe then I'll understand.