I cannot slip up. And it’s not because anyone would notice. I don’t even think I’d notice. Thank you for noticing.
It was such a small slip-up. But it was noticed I stuttered, thinking I might explain my mistake or just let my words melded into a dribble of incoherencies which some might take as remorse.
As if I had a choice but to how I was acting about being caught I just spit and sputtered as my accusers looked on, shaking their heads.

embankment
concealment
revealment
annulment
reconcilement
happy-ever-after-ment

I don’t want to find out that kitty was the better part of me. That little furry friend was a pain in my ass most days, always underfoot, nagged for me for food and more food.
Yes, I guess she was the better part of me.

I captured this little thing and felt it move in my hand. I wanted to open my hand but knew it would escape. I could only marvel and feel satisfied that I could feel it moving in my hand-but that was all I could. I could only imagined what it really looked like; see it through to fantastical future prizes and accolades at what I had.
But I could not let it go. I could not open my hand and let other see.
It would fly away, that little thing and I worried someone else might catch it. And maybe they would. But they would have my same problem.

Lotion for this, lotion for that. Lotion for everything.
Except for that.

Each, in his own way, has a part to play as a young man, attending their very first funeral. Thirteen is devastated. Inconsolable. Fourteen looks on at his younger brother crying and thinks “Boy is Fifteen going to let him have it, for acting that way.”
And Fifteen does. He’s nearly a foot taller than Thirteen and easily lifts him off the bed with one hand as he sternly apprises his younger brother as a sissy-faggot-queer for crying like that, so dramatically and with plenty of tears.

The youngest brother is thirteen, the middle brother is fourteen and the oldest brother is fifteen. That morning they woke up with different ideas, different ways each planned to go about this very sad but special day.

The three of them were told, the night before, that their grandfather had died.

I love feeling remorse. It means I am human. I used to be this stick figure, drawn on construction paper in kindergarten class.
I was limited then. Now look! I am alive and I breathe. And hurt. Just like every one else. I also love. They say love is a action. But to act, you have to leave the paper and speak. Now I do. I love. I do all of those things now.

I am, I am, I am, I am, I am, I am…
Oh. Nevermind.

I may never know (what?)
I may never love (who?)
But I will always be (what?)