Shruthi D.

The Love of My Life

It’s 12:00 AM at midnight
Why I can’t I fall asleep for the love of god
To cure my problem, I resort to my love and savior
My Romeo, my IPhone
It’s now 2:00 AM and my eyes are still glued to the cellular device
Why does this feel like an everlasting addiction that is never going to end?
I am not the only one at fault, there are millions of other people who struggle with the same
dilemma
I ask myself everyday
Why am I like this?
Why can’t I be better?
I tell myself
“Stop being lazy, get your butt up and be productive”
But those words never mean anything
Once I come back from school,
I put Romeo aside to finish my homework, but I hear this buzz over and over again
I try not to put my hands over Romeo but the frontal lobe of my brain cannot take the tension
Its buzzing trimmer like an earthquake reminding me that
If I don’t alert to its warning, my family and world will shatter into pieces
I can’t do it, I can’t help myself but to answer
Relationships are like that
You have to be responsive
At least that’s what my parents taught me
Why am so in love with Romeo?
Most of the time when I am on social media he doesn’t do anything better but bring me down
He claims to connect me to people but all the touch screen does is disconnect
Pulling me further away from them
Where they are covered up by a thick layer of fog
A layer that cannot be diminished
I am always stuck up to comparing myself to others, to Romeo
Why can’t I be perfect like her or him?
Or why can’t have 5,987 likes on every picture I post
It’s all just in my mind
May 6, 2016, on my bus home from school
He was quiet
Tension was thick and I intended to break it
I got off the bus and reached for him
He was nowhere to be found 
Who stole him from me?
Am I going to get another Romeo?
What happened to him?
All thoughts of terror
The addiction is a usurper of craving
Like MSG triggering all of the pleasure points of my brain
But I’ve never tasted better and don’t want to stop eating
I hope to stop though
I need to stop
But I can’t stop loving him