David

10 08 2011

You know what I found this morning, in a long-unopened compartment of my wallet? It was a letter from you, dated several years and a lifetime ago. Tucked into the folds were three balayong blossoms, dry and fragile from being pressed for so long. You loved me then, I remember. You recorded these promises for posterity, so that I can read them over and over again and know what I meant to you. And then you changed your mind.

Dammit, David. How can I still be hurting over this now? People’s hearts get broken every day. People get left behind, and people move on. So why the heck am I here, plenty of time and plenty of adventures later, crying over sheets of paper that no longer hold anything real? It’s not like I spent my days wallowing in heartbreak. Eventually, I stopped missing you or even thinking about you. I loved, I laughed, I engaged. I did things that matter. I grew up a little every day, and I stopped wanting you back. You are no longer a part of my life — most of the time.

But some days just catch me off guard. It could be the little details, like the sight of my own palm, messy with squiggles and lines whenever I write with a ballpoint pen. I can almost hear your exasperated laugh,  almost see you trying to figure out why the ink that should have landed on paper ended up on my hand instead.  Or it could be the big things, David, the wounds received in the process of living.  Somehow, every goodbye is still an echo of yours, every person walking away steps in your footprints until they are out of sight. And suddenly there would be tears flooding my throat all over again. After all this freaking time.

So here I am today, writing on tear-soaked paper, thinking that’s enough. That’s more than enough. I want to love again like I loved you, in spite of risk, in spite of fear. Loving you taught me just how much I could give and how far I can go, and I don’t want to lose that. I want to offer myself again to someone, the right someone. You didn’t stay, David, but someone else will. Someone else deserves this misguided intensity of emotion that I wasted on you, long after you didn’t want it anymore.

I’ve always been the one who remembers. In a way, I’ve come to accept that, the inability to really forget what was once important. The memories will remind me to be careful, but I could stand to let go of the souvenirs. It’s been over for so long. This is the part, I think, where I stop letting it hurt.


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Categories : Love, Post A Week Challenge, Swirl of Thoughts, The Cuyo Detour

Of doppelgangers, accidental meetings, and letting go

26 07 2011

It’s insane how much you look like my first love. You walked up to me on the seashore early one morning, and the shock of recognition was followed by a strong sense of disorientation. What are you doing here, Alex? I thought. Here, of all places, in my somewhere else. When you said something (it was about the sunrise, I think, but I was still too unsettled to remember), I realized that you weren’t him, just someone who looked remarkably similar. Several days of running into each other, and sort of becoming friends, haven’t dulled the resemblance. You even move like him, for goodness’ sake.

You made me surprise myself, you know. There was a time, long ago, when any reminder of him would have hurt, or felt bittersweet. Not anymore. I take pleasure in your smile, that wonderfully familiar grin that automatically makes me want to smile back, and it takes me back to the laughter that made me fall in love. There’s a feeling of being in two places when I’m with you: one in which I’m enjoying your company, and another where I’m wandering in the past. None of this is painful, just odd and funny and surprisingly easy. Twice, I almost called you by his name, just luckily catching myself in time. It’s a double world I’m living in, and meeting you has taken me there.

This isn’t really about you, I’m sorry. I don’t truly know who you are beneath your likeness to another man. There isn’t enough time to find out, because you’re leaving the island soon. We’re both transients here, you and I, and it’s a funny twist of fate that brought us together that day under the sunrise.

I think it’s okay, that we won’t really get to know each other. Perhaps our meeting is a gift, one that I needed more than I realized. You showed me that I have what it takes to move on. I have a problem with that, you see, with moving on. I linger at the spot of every important goodbye, watching the person walk away until the final glimpse is gone, hoping for one last backwards glance. I’m never the first to turn away; I’m always the one who’s haunted. Meeting you, enjoying the ease of looking into eyes that take me back to a different time, have reminded me that even if it takes longer than most, I do move on. Maybe I never forget, but I can eventually remember without pain. And that gives me hope.

When you go, I won’t ever see you again. You’ll be one of those significant strangers, the ones who stay just a little while but leave a lasting imprint. In this case, I think you’ll take away something, too, the fear that I have a heart that doesn’t heal. It’s enough. It’s more than I thought a stranger can give, but that’s what you did, even if you didn’t know it. Thank you. I won’t ever get to say this out loud, but thank you.


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Categories : Love, The Cuyo Detour

Before and After

20 02 2011

I used to know the exact moment you walked into a room. I would feel you there, and I’d turn, and a sense of peacefulness would grow inside me, immediately, without exception. I could be hurting or afraid; it didn’t matter. Your presence meant that no matter what was wrong, there was still something right.

Now it’s all too easy to pretend you’re not there. To see a photograph and look at everyone but you. The longer I could look away, the more it meant that the obsession was over.

I don’t know if that’s a good thing or not.

 

(This is a response to the 100 words challenge in Velvet Verbosity. The word for the week was “within”.)


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Categories : 100 Words, Flash Fiction, Love, Writing Prompts

Leftover hurt

1 02 2011

This morning, I saw Facebook pictures of this girl on a night out with my friends.  I was surprised to find myself tearing up, surprised that even now, the sight of her with them still felt like a punch to the gut. She and I had a history, if having someone you loved and trusted go behind your back and turn all your friends against you can be called a history. It left me completely isolated and unable to trust anyone when I desperately needed a support system to deal with bipolar disorder.

But that was more than a year ago. I had already forgiven her, even without her asking. I had forgiven the people who, for months, had listened to her talking against me without telling me anything. I even started spending time with them again, getting back some of the closeness that had been lost. Some friendships never completely recovered, but a few precious ones became stronger than before.

So why did it still hurt?

I searched myself for any desire for revenge, a longing perhaps to see her as isolated as I had been. It honestly wasn’t there. In a twisted way, I understood that what she did was justified to her, and that she had suffered as well. It was never her betrayal that did the most damage anyway, it was the passive response to it of people whom I trusted to have my back. But even those relationships have been slowly repaired.

Gradually, it dawned on me why the wound never completely healed. It was never acknowledged. After the debacle, I withdrew from everybody involved to struggle with my depression on my own. Some made efforts to reach out, but I felt too wary and vulnerable, too exhausted and battered, to respond. It was a long while before I got back in touch, and by that time everyone, including myself, just wanted things to be normal. The incident was glossed over, forgotten, never spoken of again. I could only really talk about it to one person, but to everyone else, it might as well never have happened.

I thought all I needed to do so that I could move on was to forgive. But there’s still some leftover hurt beneath the surface, an aching need for someone to say, “Yes, this happened. It was traumatic, and it hurt you — you’re allowed to be hurt. I’m hurting for you, too.” With life going on as usual, it seemed like the pain didn’t matter, that it wasn’t of any consequence to anyone, even to myself. I buried it under my desire to go back to the way things were, but this morning it reminded me that I still didn’t have closure. It reminded me that forgiveness is one thing, but healing takes not only time, but an acknowledgement that the wound is real in the first place.


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Categories : Bipolar Disorder, Swirl of Thoughts

Still haunted

26 11 2010

It is such a simple thing, an embrace. The first memory you gave me, and the last one I’ll forget.

I’ve been discarding all the things I miss about you, one by one, like plastic pearls from a broken necklace. No matter how beautiful they seem, I now know exactly what they’re worth, and I have to let them go. There was one that looked so perfect I thought it was real — the image of you looking up at me from the water as I hesitated, just about to jump. Trust me, you said. I will never let you get hurt. So I jumped, and you were there, and I started to think that maybe you always will be. Now that memory lies in the dust with the rest, all the other promises and gestures and smiles that turned out to be less than real in the end.

But the memory of your embrace remains. The first one, when I started to realize that you might become more important than all the others, was that afternoon on the couch, when you held me in your arms and sang me to sleep, running your fingers softly through my hair over and over again. I could feel your strength and all of your breathtaking gentleness, and the tenderness of the moment surrounded me like a forest, like a place I might get lost in forever and never want to leave. I felt safe, cherished, and utterly at peace. I felt loved.

But now I no longer feel anything but disillusioned, and I would do anything to forget. So how do I erase the memory of a touch, when it turns out that it doesn’t mean what I thought it meant? How can I stop remembering the way that you held me, now that you have irrevocably let me go?

It is such a simple thing, an embrace. But it is far less simple to forget.


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By the sea

17 10 2010

I went out with a friend today. We went out and we sat by the ocean, and somehow the conversation turned to the first one who broke my heart. Suddenly, I found myself talking about you again, after long years of thinking of you too much, then trying to forget, and finally succeeding. I surprised myself with all the little things I remembered — the way your laugh always made me feel like laughing, too, the way your eyes lit up with that irresistible smile, the way our friends always introduced us as childhood sweethearts and I’d protest that we weren’t, while you were quite happy to pretend that I’ve had a crush on you since kindergarten. I haven’t thought about all these things for so long, never even noticed the moment when I grew out of the habit of keeping you in mind. But now, with the gates of memory unlocked, I found myself remembering your hands on a guitar, your hands that could coax the sweetest music from any instrument you touched, your hands that used to hold mine. I could almost feel the thrill of it all again — my hero worship, the slow transition from seeing you as my best friend’s big brother to someone I could fall in love with, the stunned wonder when I realized you felt the same. It was my first time, and it was better than all the stories said it would be.

That day, as I sat watching the waves and allowed the memories to flow out of me, as I sat reminiscing about all that we used to mean to each other, I realized that it didn’t hurt anymore. There wasn’t even the slightest tinge of sadness. The what-ifs and the might-have-beens no longer haunted me. I could think about you, and talk about you, without pain. I could look back at all the wonderful little details that made you who you were, and realize that there is someone else who knows you better now, and be happy for you. I could take pride in the decent, honorable man that I knew you to be, and even though it didn’t work out, at least I know it was worth a try. You were one of the good guys. Not the right one, not meant for me, but worthwhile. And it’s okay.

Getting over you, being able to put you firmly in the past and wish you well for the future, being able to talk about you with fondness — it frees me. Though my heart is broken now for another reason, perhaps I can hope that someday, after the healing passage of time, I will sit by the ocean again, and watch the waves,  and laugh.


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Categories : Love, Swirl of Thoughts

The Long Way Home

23 09 2010

She felt unbearably fragile.

The words hung in the air between them, and she couldn’t bear to look up and see him. Or let him see her.

They were true, she knew, the words she had spoken. And so it shouldn’t have mattered what he replied, because that truth came with a numbness, a protection of its own. She waited longingly for that numbness to come, but it didn’t. For the first time, it didn’t. She couldn’t escape what that meant.

He could hurt her. Even now, by just leaving, he could hurt her. Because she needed him. And she had rejected him with her words that were true.

“I can’t. I know you want me to be brave again, but I can’t.”

She had to make him understand. Before he gave her more than she could ever return. Before it became more unfair to him than it already was. She owed him the truth.

It must have been only a few seconds, but his silence seemed to stretch through the night. She turned her head, away from him, towards the empty street and the sidewalk she would have to walk alone later. The city lights glowed on the pavement. She felt cold.

Then his hands were on her face, turning her back to him. Gently.

“Hey,” he said, his tone as tender as his touch. One fingertip traced the trail of moisture from the teardrop she had tried to hide from him. Slowly, hesitantly, she met his gaze.

His eyes were direct, intense. His voice was low, but clear and compelling in the cold air. “You don’t have to be anything you don’t want to be. Not for me.”

The words slammed into her heart, pounded on the walls that had been necessary for so long. She couldn’t say anything past the tightness in her throat.

“Come on,” he said after a few moments. He was smiling. “I’ll walk you home.”


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Categories : Love, This is fiction, ok? FICTION.

A Small Step at Sunset

8 09 2010

She sat on the grass under the huge acacia tree, watching the sky change color from a clear blue to the glowing hues of sunset through the lacy patterns made by the branches and leaves. It had been a good day. She had gone out with her friend Jake, wandered around town with him for a bit, until they both ended up in this peaceful place where the traffic sounds faded away. It was just the two of them, the sunset, and their thoughts.

It was the first time he’d done this with anyone, Jake said — just sitting on the grass watching the sunlight fade into dusk. Smiling, she told him she’d never been to this spot before, either. She usually watched the sunset somewhere else, with — no. She would not think of him tonight. She would not ruin this moment with memories that were beautiful once but were tainted now, because he left.

Restless, she absent-mindedly picked at the grass, feeling the soothing coolness of their leaves against her fingers. She plucked and pulled until she found a particularly long blade. Automatically, her hands moved to start weaving a grass ring, like she always did with…. Sigh. The memories would not leave her alone tonight.

Helplessly, her mind flooded with images of the first time they watched a sunset together. The first time she made him a grass ring. The many times he promised he would never let her go. The last time she believed him. She took a deep breath, willing herself to shake off the painful questions that she knew might never be answered.

Jake looked at her in concern, but she just smiled and shook her head. He was a good friend, but she knew he had his own ghosts, too. They were both haunted. They  both needed to forget. She needed to let go of what she never thought she’d lose, and he needed to give up on what he knew he couldn’t have.  The difference was that he could talk about it, and she couldn’t. Not yet. Maybe someday. She looked forward  to someday.

In the fading light, she looked at the half-finished ring in her hands. She took another deep breath, preparing herself to break yet another link to him. Despite a sentimental hesitation, she knew there was no point in preserving what was no longer real. He was lost to her, permanently. It was time to make new memories. Slowly, she started weaving again, knowing this one was for Jake, but also for herself. She was letting herself let him go.


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Categories : Love, Swirl of Thoughts

Eventually…

31 08 2010

It might take a while. It might be harder than expected. But it will happen.

Eventually.


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Categories : Love

A Different Ever-after

27 08 2010

It’s always been your favorite part of the fairytale — the happy ending. You waited for it in every book and hoped for your own version all your life. Then some time ago, you thought you found it, with him. And maybe to others he’s a pretty average guy, but you saw something different, something that made you believe he’s the one.  So you gave your heart.

But things went wrong, as they sometimes will. Life isn’t a storybook. And the one you thought was there to rescue you instead rode off into the sunset and left you behind. He’s gone. And just like that, it’s over.

Knowing that, you push yourself to let go, and to a certain degree you think you’ve succeeded. Yet there’s still that tempting fantasy, that dangerous hope — that somehow, after all these twists and turns, you can still be with him. You can still have your happy ending. So maybe you’re unaware of it, maybe you say otherwise, but deep inside, you’re still holding on.

However, there’s another kind of happy ending, one that doesn’t ask you to live your life always looking backwards. It’s when you finally learn that even without this person, you have a right to be okay. You have a right to make new memories to replace the ones tainted by disillusionment. You have a right to feel that your heart is whole again — not twisted with the pain that’s been your constant reality since he left. But you have to make a choice.

You have to choose that road, the one that leads to healing. You have to stop waiting on that spot where you were together for the last time, that spot where you hope he’ll return. Because that’s where he broke your heart, and no matter how difficult it is to accept that he’s not coming back, there’s no longer any reason for you to stay. It’s time to move on.

And once you do, it won’t be easy. It won’t be instant. Sometimes you might feel like you’re going nowhere. But take your time, and celebrate the little things. Maybe it’s something as simple as not noticing it’s his favorite song on the radio. Or perhaps it’s being able to go to a special place with someone else and not him. Or it could be the first time you hear his name without flinching inside. It starts with those little steps. And soon, after every hard-earned inch, you’ll look behind you and realize that you’re walking away from that place of heartbreak. Slowly, and not always without steps backward, little by little you’re moving on.

At the end of that road is something better than what you left behind. And once you get there, you’ll know that every step, every stumble, was worth it. And that journey that you took, all the way from brokenness to being whole again — that’s your story. And the best part of it is that it doesn’t have to end.

(written as requested by summerlight) :)


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Categories : Love, Swirl of Thoughts

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