IN THE FINAL HOURS before dawn, as the encumbered moon wanes from heaven to heartache, the little finger on your left hand twitches. It wiggles three times, tic-tic-tic, and the right corner of your mouth smirks lightly. I wonder what your dreams are of, and I imitate your smirk. With a slight tilt of my head, I imagine kissing you softly. I imagine you biting my lower lip, drawing blood, laughing devilishly, kissing my open mouth passionately; I imagine you devouring me. I often watch you while you sleep and wake myself to catch the twilight hours. It is during these moments, our only peace, that I hate you more than ever. More than I hated you last April. More than I hate you each morning when I awaken only to find the outline of a heart, or a puckered kiss, smeared on the bathroom mirror in varying degrees of burgundy red lies. In these moments, my twilight purgatories, I know who you are. I see right through your jokes, the crafty little tales you weave from weakened threads of hope. The sweetness I smell the sickening sweetness on your breath as your laughter sings and dances through the tequila-flooded halls of my head.

Thickly veiled shadows seeped from behind your intricate affectations once, last April, when you thought I wasn't looking.

In the final hours before dawn, in the twilight of my sanity, I hate to watch you sleep. And I hate the fact that I still love you so fucking much.