I held my breath tightly against the shivers coursing through my body. Darkness ate away the edges of my vision and numbness stole away my fingers. I kept holding though. Watching the last bubble of precious air escape my lips. Then it became all black. But I never let go.

It was a burden on all her muscles. A hollow deeper than her bones. She braced herself though, she knew why Atlas stood so tall.

And they danced with laughter and tears. They swung each other round and round, the first and last time in years.

In time, he began to see the details that held us like invisible stitches together. The scars we held within, the tears despite our dry faces. He saw the little sigh that came with the song. The way our breathing became labored even though nothing seemed wrong. He peeked into the aimless gaze of daydreamers, reliving their worst moments, commending them on being so strong.

He spoke in polished honesty free of liar's filth. He said the hardest words with an unshakable voice, a wide smile, with fear and doubt freezing over his core. The truth was the best route, but the truth could always be costly... another truth. A sad truth.

She was the sort of girl who flooded my five senses. Her voice was melody to my ears, her taste gave birth to an eternal thirst, her scent sprouted goosebumps along the length of my body, her touch riveted with electricity that would've been static with any other... all these things considered, it was impossible for me not to stare. I began to see her everywhere, in everything.

Whether it was in the maze of my fantastical mind or the allure of her gossamer eyes, they took me to undiscovered worlds of azure and metamorphosis. The air shimmered with every breath, the water tightened with every sound.

Her words were slickly lacquered, dripping with venom that singed the air as they fell. She traced her tongue up my neck and whispered in a way that would shatter glass. "It's the words inbetween," she said, "those are the ones I truly mean." Then, her toes curled with the release of the truth she kept hidden.

It was the end for something. It was the beginning for another. But in reality it just fell in the middle. In that confusing moment of time between my birth and my death.