Take Me With You

by Nina G. Jones

That's the thing about keeping a person alive. In a way you are just as much a hostage to them as they are to you.

He likes the taste of my sadness and I like when he injects me with his venom.

“Who am I?” he asks in that voice, dirty and broken. “I am the person who has nothing to lose but you.”

we are both hopelessly bound to the other, holding each other afloat. And if one of us snaps the line or sinks, the other will drown.

You don't stare the devil in the eyes and come out without some of his sin. You can't beat the devil without becoming like him. You can't appeal to his kindness, so you have to learn to play his games. You lie, you fuck, you manipulate, you fight, you hurl insults, until you do whatever it takes to win the battle. Every time you do those things, you understand him a little more. Until finally, he becomes your ally. You think you've won, that you've made him more like you. But the truth is, it's the other way around. So that even when you win, you've lost.

Love isn't flowers or poetry.