TICK TOCK
Megan Caldwell
It’s never over, I’m never better…I’m sitting here,
I’m sitting here on a frat couch (delta lambda omega phi pi mu, BRO)
trying my best to enjoy the overzealous flirt to my left while
pounding you in my thoughts (tastefully, I promise)
to the rhythm of this strangely loud TICK TOCK somewhere
behind me. There’s an odd picture on the wall, next to a mildly
inflated school mascot blowup wearing a broken pair of free
sunglasses from the earlier hockey game. Your absence has driven me
to wondering, wondering about that puzzle we left on the table,
TICK TOCK wondering where you slithered off to, who you slunk off with,
where the missing pieces went,
leaving me to blankly stare at it like it’s a work of art.
It’s missing small blotches here and there, a chunk from both sides--
the picture’s true identity is anyone’s guess (maybe a snowy landscape?)
Honestly, did you take them? Hide them?
Who steals puzzle pieces? TICK TOCK What use are they without all the rest?
I swear. Have you ever played with puzzles? (pause then mumbling)
You liar. (more mumbling, louder now)
Fine, fine! Whatever. Either way, you’re clearly not doing it “right”.
You simply pick up a piece and consider it TICK TOCK then follow up by either
A) dropping said piece and moving on, or
B) placing it in the fucking puzzle. TICK TOCK Now I can’t stop laughing. hiccup.
As if I know how any of these fragments fit together. You’ve got me so mixed up
I don’t know what’s right. Hic—what does “right” even mean?—cup. You know,
sometimes, when we’ve been breaking (err, bending) the rules, TICK TOCK
I couldn’t tell you where you end and I begin. It’s bad when I’m sober,
yet worse when I’m drunk. You wanna talk about some blurred lines (!)
when you’ve got me six drinks in, TICK TOCK my heart is in my toes.
Hell, it’s all I can do to keep my hands under my seat like a kid in timeout.
TICK TOCK. “I mean, I could get you another beer and—”
“Naw. This party sucks.” I can’t --> I shouldn’t --> I won’t --> I will.
That didn’t take very long. TICK TOCK. Okay, okay. okay!
I give in. But this is how it would go: (hush i’m talking)
Enter yours truly, trying to play passive for the first minute,
feigning hard to get, my eyes lying over my teeth, through my lips. And then
I’m on top of you, TICK TOCK rolling my hips over yours,
making your neck dark, and we’re flying–TICK TOCK TICK TOCK—moaning
and groaning and boning. O. slow. Oh. Oh. silence. (wait)
I’m so sick but I’m living (ticktock) and the aftertaste is all tequila and limes
and salt
and your skin, your skin, your skin. It’s on repeat inside my mind.
The way you breathe in your sleep (heavy sighing when you’re tired)
is in there somewhere too, a broken record (tick...tock) I put on to play when
leaning over to kiss you and the sun brushes our faces
bright with sunshine. I remember your blue eyes and your freckled, crooked
nose,
your dog barking outside greeting me home. I remember sneaking away
and running through the woods together, watching fish swim, and I think you
should know,
I think you should know these things because for once in my life,
when I kiss someone, when I kiss you, I don’t think. (tick…tock) I kiss you
over and over and over… Never better but never worse, so I’m praying you’ll
find this action, these bodies, this love (?) endless.
(whispering and laughing) Fuckkk. I hate puzzles.
I’m sitting here on a frat couch (delta lambda omega phi pi mu, BRO)
trying my best to enjoy the overzealous flirt to my left while
pounding you in my thoughts (tastefully, I promise)
to the rhythm of this strangely loud TICK TOCK somewhere
behind me. There’s an odd picture on the wall, next to a mildly
inflated school mascot blowup wearing a broken pair of free
sunglasses from the earlier hockey game. Your absence has driven me
to wondering, wondering about that puzzle we left on the table,
TICK TOCK wondering where you slithered off to, who you slunk off with,
where the missing pieces went,
leaving me to blankly stare at it like it’s a work of art.
It’s missing small blotches here and there, a chunk from both sides--
the picture’s true identity is anyone’s guess (maybe a snowy landscape?)
Honestly, did you take them? Hide them?
Who steals puzzle pieces? TICK TOCK What use are they without all the rest?
I swear. Have you ever played with puzzles? (pause then mumbling)
You liar. (more mumbling, louder now)
Fine, fine! Whatever. Either way, you’re clearly not doing it “right”.
You simply pick up a piece and consider it TICK TOCK then follow up by either
A) dropping said piece and moving on, or
B) placing it in the fucking puzzle. TICK TOCK Now I can’t stop laughing. hiccup.
As if I know how any of these fragments fit together. You’ve got me so mixed up
I don’t know what’s right. Hic—what does “right” even mean?—cup. You know,
sometimes, when we’ve been breaking (err, bending) the rules, TICK TOCK
I couldn’t tell you where you end and I begin. It’s bad when I’m sober,
yet worse when I’m drunk. You wanna talk about some blurred lines (!)
when you’ve got me six drinks in, TICK TOCK my heart is in my toes.
Hell, it’s all I can do to keep my hands under my seat like a kid in timeout.
TICK TOCK. “I mean, I could get you another beer and—”
“Naw. This party sucks.” I can’t --> I shouldn’t --> I won’t --> I will.
That didn’t take very long. TICK TOCK. Okay, okay. okay!
I give in. But this is how it would go: (hush i’m talking)
Enter yours truly, trying to play passive for the first minute,
feigning hard to get, my eyes lying over my teeth, through my lips. And then
I’m on top of you, TICK TOCK rolling my hips over yours,
making your neck dark, and we’re flying–TICK TOCK TICK TOCK—moaning
and groaning and boning. O. slow. Oh. Oh. silence. (wait)
I’m so sick but I’m living (ticktock) and the aftertaste is all tequila and limes
and salt
and your skin, your skin, your skin. It’s on repeat inside my mind.
The way you breathe in your sleep (heavy sighing when you’re tired)
is in there somewhere too, a broken record (tick...tock) I put on to play when
leaning over to kiss you and the sun brushes our faces
bright with sunshine. I remember your blue eyes and your freckled, crooked
nose,
your dog barking outside greeting me home. I remember sneaking away
and running through the woods together, watching fish swim, and I think you
should know,
I think you should know these things because for once in my life,
when I kiss someone, when I kiss you, I don’t think. (tick…tock) I kiss you
over and over and over… Never better but never worse, so I’m praying you’ll
find this action, these bodies, this love (?) endless.
(whispering and laughing) Fuckkk. I hate puzzles.
