Relationships, ALL OF THEM, are complicated in some way. If not initially, then something happens to taint them along the way; friends struggle to address what needs addressing. Hopefully, it always comes out with both intact, but not always. Life is that way sometimes.

Another Type of Love by David Guerrieri

I was a handful and
she had very small hands,
handing me love I
couldn’t handle and
it was no secret
we knew each other’s secrets
quietly speaking through tears
and farewell in exchange
for another type of love—
one we both could afford.

The Alaska Option by J. Cameron Davis

Colby and I always talked about the Alaska Option, while we were in rehab.

Both determined to quit killing ourselves with drugs and alcohol. Both tired of hurting our loved ones.

If we ever relapsed, we decided we’d hop a bus to Alaska, get high as a kite, and kill ourselves.

As I boarded the bus, teary eyed and concealing a bottle of vodka and a pipe in my suit pocket, I thought about the Alaska Option.

When I got to the cemetery, I poured the bottle over Colby’s gravestone and smashed the pipe, thinking of what could have been.