is that it’s like exhuming a body to check for foul play. you’re not sure what you’re looking for–the shape of the pain, whose fingerprints, the type of knife they used–but it’s the smell that hits you first: undeniably sour and rotten, even though you tried your best to dress it up with bows and your favorite lace dress and john green quotes like how you were just a drizzle but she was a hurricane. you are embarrassed and ashamed but you cannot look away. so you continue to reexamine: what was i really feeling when i reblogged that emo photo of tyler durden or those arctic monkey lyrics in dreamcore font? or was it more so part of the aesthetic, the narrative, the way that death certificates are padded with formalities for closure? now that you look at it again, maybe nihilism does look hotter in a leather jacket. and maybe it’s simply the truth that memory is a sloppy mortician who allows time to swallow the answers. now only the curated decay remains, decomposing in sepia.