before bed, i would rattle off a list of friends and relatives, from immediate family to pets, after the words god bless. it was more superstition than religion, and even now on my most anxiety prone nights the near forgotten ritual soothes me in a way nothing else can. i pray for cats and great grandparents that died years ago. the names flow into each other, forming a stream of syllables that can be best translated as "please don't let anything happen to anyone i know." before bed, kids start asking questions, they make up stories and fears and develop thirsts that do nothing but make them interrupt their peaceful sleep to pee several hours later. they ask me to lay beside them, to run my nails through their hair or hold their little hands because of the dark, the thunder, a small cut that still bleeds just a bit, or perhaps lonliness. often i stay past their settled breathing, cause i'm afraid to stir and wake them, or perhaps just because it's what my mother used to do for me.

before bed is how i fell in love with him. after sex and a shower, eyes wide and skin soft. i love him when i'm half asleep, even if he's wide awake and insisting that i tell him a story (even though he already knows everything). cold sheets and warm flesh, twisting into improbable positions so that his presence is the final thing i'm certain of whenever sleep comes. it's love as a blanket, intimacy as a sleep aid, and the ultimate comfort of an earnest yearning for repetition. before bed i would write how i felt after the day, what moments stuck and which ones i didn't want to slip away. i'd exhaust anger with harsh pen strokes; i'd let tears punctuate self-pitying prose. i'd try to make sense of the feelings i felt and the feelings i wanted others to feel for me. before bed i'd attempt to write out illicit desires, to justify the things i wished i hadn't done with pages upon pages of run-on rationalization. i'd transition from waking to sleeping by signing my name at the bottom of the page, as if to say this proves that i was here, on this day, and at least that will remain.