the realtor asked how many bedrooms i wanted, what kind of neighborhood, what homely features. bloated with four years of constant drinking i gathered my focus in my hands and did not say, i do not know, i have never been home.
we wandered through house after house, and i met the ghosts of others' pets, aging parents, lack of money, shortcut repairs. when finally i met you, i was convinced no one else lived here, you were grey and white and pale and clean. i touched your attic walls, wrenched your basement plumbing myself.
i broke up with someone who needed me as i signed the papers. they could not stand that i had a home other than them. two years later a mutual friend will tell me that their home is hoarded, stuffed full of reminders that i am not there.
but you and i, we keep our hands clean. we keep our walls firm. we flood the basement occasionally, the stinking mud a reminder of what lies beneath and what will always be broken. you are broken in all the right ways for me. we chose each other.