"How come you never

reply to me?" You asked

one foggy day underneath

the dim lit corner of the

cafe.

"Is it something about

me that shuts your

lips up and stitches

them with horror?

Is it that the words

that fall out of my lips

are screams of torment?

Hopeless drops of alcohol?"

I shook my head.

"Then what?"

I grasped your tiny fingers

and pulled you underneath the

same tree, the one where

the balloon was once tied

to. And out of my pocket

came a drawing, a drawing

of you.

The fault is not in our stars,

but only in ourselves, my

darling.