Dedicated to the love of my life so I thought.

Part I: The End

It doesn’t feel good to walk away but silence has always been the loudest form of communication and the equivalent of abandonment for me. It leaves pockets of pain and causes confusion, discomfort, and insecurities but from you I accepted it. I gave you space and opportunity hoping one day you’ll wake up and say “you’re enough for me”, “I don’t want anyone else”, “you’re it for me”. I was wrong.. I was delusional for believing hearing those things from you are truly a possibility. That there was a reality in that fairytale I created.

Yet, I’m not upset at you but at me for falling in love with an idea of us that never existed. I’m upset at me for even falling for you. I’ve let the silent weeks go by and began reflecting on the very beginning. The late night and early morning we met by chance on my birthday as if I was truly the only person you really met in that gap of time. I should’ve let you be but the fairytale in me saw you and thought “He’s for me”. I question myself about why I perused you. I hung on to someone who told me and showed me on more than one occasion they had no desire to be held..

I often wonder if I forced my love on you and if you were so internally kind hearted you simply just kept me around. Was it convenient? Did it feel good? Did you feel obligated? Was I means of satisfaction sexually? I’m starting to wish the first time you walked away you never came back because that’s when I started refusing to let go. That’s when it began the disconnect between needing reassurance and clarity.

I must’ve imagined the connection.. I look back on old messages and see the distance, the discomfort, the anxiety, the desire to love but disgust in processing the dosage, the small breadcrumbs, and even the neural responses. Yet I don’t view you as a monster but maybe I am for never leaving your side. For believing you were my person, cutting off male interaction, praying for us, moving for us. I made a mistake. I watched you suffocate and tolerate while begging you to meet me halfway.

It then struck me.. That’s why you never asked, never asked to see me, prioritize us, go out on more dates, meet your family or friends, talk or text with meaning or feeling. I fell in love with someone who was drowning in their frustration and capacity.

I made a mistake believing in this because you’ve showed me the signs and the difficulty in this. Oddly enough I thought I could handle this. I thought I was in love before and realized I simply just wanted to be appreciated while nurturing someone else. I thought I felt those parts of love before until I met you and I fell in love hard and the love I felt for you knocked the wind out chest and straight into your arms. Harder than the man I loved on from 22 to 26. Harder than the baby I’d never really got to keep to break cycles instead of building families. I made a mistake in falling for you because I realized I couldn’t seem to get up.

Terrified that in falling you’d watch me drown, keep me down not because it’s cruel but you don’t have the capacity to catch me in this fall, to meet me there, to love me a float and lean on each other. You leaned on you and put you first always and maybe I made you feel trapped, pressured, vulnerable, or added a responsibility on your plate you didn’t ask for. I don’t know but I made a mistake and only hurt myself by trying to hold space for forever with You..

I think about us every night and remind myself I did the right thing walking away because you’d never come for me, you’d never fight for me, you’d respond with silence and I was reminded that no answer is an answer and you made the decision to walk away then. It showed me you didn’t need or want me and in turn I need to learn not to need you, not to want you, to release you and allow you to have the things you want without being in your way. I occupy my time learning to get up from this fall and start over again alone.

After months of understanding I don’t have a choice but to let go because I’ve watch you silently give up and tolerate. I chose to break my own pattern of refusing to let you go of chasing you and running back to you hoping you’d tighten the grip. Finally, I matched your silence. Your distance. I shut myself off and sat in the hurt until I didn’t feel it enough to tell myself “you’re ok”, “if he wanted to he would”, “if he wanted us he’d be here”. As long as I kept those thoughts and your silence remained I could move on. Move on to aloneness and wake up from this dream because in reality I just started over from scratch and I need to figure out what a new life out here looks like alone.

I thought you were forever and in finally understanding I was not and how delusion can beat your ass with a smile and a dream then simply burst your bubble and drop you back into reality. I pray still everyday you meet someone that keeps you on your toes, that gives you butterflies, safety, encouragement, comfort, laughter, and desire that makes you want to see them everyday and build like never before. Everyday I pray for your happiness in knowing it wasn’t me for you..

But I hope soon one day I pray for my own happiness and fully let you go too. I promise to leave you alone and try to move on with my life. To not bother you or graze your presents with emotion. I made a decision to be a stranger because in these past weeks that’s what I’ve felt like all over again. A stranger. An old conversation. A regretful situation that lingered a bit too long in your life. Somebody you simply used to date like all the stories you’ve told me before. I finally became one of those “I dated this one girl and she ..”. I prayed I’d never make it to that list, lingering in those private files, or became an old conversation. I just wanted to instead be your last. Truth be told there isn’t a day that goes by I wish I knew the last time was the last time so that last “I love you” lingered different. That last cuddle would give closure. That last kiss would say goodbye but it didn’t. It feels unfinished even when it’s finished and all I’m left with is my version of this love story to paint.