i remember when he first saw them. there were seven. seven perfectly flawed lines, hard dark ridges of deception. i promised. i promised. and when he met my eyes, i could have melted, dripped into a puddle of humiliation and shame, just a small sticky puddle and my eyes and his eyes and my eyes and nothing more or less than the looking of eyes. there were other puddles too; pools of brine formed rivulets and streams pouring into salty rivers into oceans of grief and i promised... with his arms around me i shook and he shook and earthquakes could not have moved us as much as we were moved by seven inches of line, seven little lines that could have broken us, shattered us into stained-glass windows... the only thing holding us together: poison. but we didn't shatter, sometimes the shaking of two is less than the shaking of one and maybe, just maybe, we can work this out.