The Blood & The Bones

It’s been a couple of weeks since you tried to come back again. Though your words seemed sincere, I knew your heart wasn’t in it. I knew your life was not ready to be the glitter that settled on the ground. You are still floating in the sunlight. Finding the place where you will fall into stability. I was tired of both of us hurting. And so I found the detached, abrasive side of myself and I put her on display. The window into me became bulletproof glass. The face hardened when you looked at me instead of softened with love. You have come in and left so many times that it was ripping my soul to shreds. And, because I love you and because I have to try to find the love for myself they took from me, I decided to become unlovable. I decided to truly let you go.

I knew what to do to lose you. I’m not saying that was always the goal. But, I had learned what to do. At first it wasn’t really a game, like you said it was. You were so in and out I used the mentioning of them to trigger you. To make you feel like you needed to do right by me before I was gone. Then, I did it to solicit love and attention. Because I always had to check the temperature of how you felt.. if you were slipping away again. And, at the end, I really did do it to push you away. Completely. As I detached you from my being I knew I was losing part of me. But, that’s love .. well, I guess to me it is. To break yourself to fix another. Because I know you’re just not ready. You don’t find yourself where I am now. I ache to go to bed with you every night. You long to see the sunrise over a new landscape. I understand. You are searching for your truth. I have done all that and found mine.

And, because I longed for you to be part of it and knew the kind of life we’d have, I applied the pressure too heavily as I always do. I was so anxious to start living completely that I couldn’t imagine waiting and couldn’t understand how you could. I drove you away with that heavy feeling of someone wanting something you cannot give. In this way, I was wrong but, then again, I was wrong a lot. But, you see, I know.. I know what I ask of you is unobtainable at this time. And, that’s part of why I decided I’d push you past the boundaries of loving me. Because the pressure is no good for you. It’s debilitating. And because I know you deserve better than me. Look, I know you haven’t done right by me but I couldn’t continue to let you doubt yourself every time it failed. I loved you too much. I do this not on on purpose. I do these things without knowing why. I won’t allow anyone to really love me and I can’t figure out how to stop. I consciously unconsciously fuck my life up.

I have tried to forget you. I have tried to forget him. I have tried to forget all of them. My demons screech in the silence so I keep myself distracted. I thought you were my reward and then I fucked that up too. I am unlovable. I think I know that now. And so I push. I push hard. I push things to the edge of the cliff and then eventually, one small nudge will do the rest. In this case, the love was a heavier rock than what I’m used to, so I took extreme measures and finally you went over the edge too. In this, you showed me that I’m not meant to be loved forever. That sounds horrible but it’s true. You showed me no one will stay. No one. I’m not worthy of it. I’m too far gone. The things this life has done to me have buried the real me. You were the nail in the coffin.

Because now you’re gone too.

I knew that when we spoke or didn’t speak. I knew that I had succeeded or failed. However you want to see it.

So, I packed up everything and returned it to you last night. Trivial things to some..stones, letters, photos and gifts. But goddamn heart wrenching reminders of failures and all the loves I have lost to me. If you could not love me anymore, knowing what you had felt for me, then who the fuck ever would? If you could give up on me then who would ever stay? I had packed it all away in different places and still everywhere I looked there were neon arrows pulsating and reminding me of the absence of love. Hell, I’d throw my bed out where we made love and you stared into my eyes and we giggled and you pushed me up against the wall most nights … and where I soaked my pillows with tears and rolled my body up into an aching ball from missing your touch until I fell into a slumber haunted with dreams of you. I’d burn it if I could afford a new one. So, I know it seems cruel to return these things to you but I couldn’t have them here and I couldn’t bear to throw them away. Because I fucking love you. And I’m going to forever.

But, you are not the one for me and I am not for you. In another life, maybe I’ll be your girl. Maybe our promises will mean something. Maybe I won’t be irrevocably fucked up and you won’t be so lost. But, you’re gone now. I saw it in your eyes. And so, I know it’s not you for me or me for you. I know it’s over now. I know I have to let go and let you live, without me and the way I made you doubt yourself when you couldn’t stay. The way I pushed you too hard. I tried to be gentle about it but gentle wasn’t welcome in this intensity. I just loved you too much and for that, I’m sorry.

Maybe you’ll be happier now. Maybe I’ll stop ruining people. Maybe I’ll stop ruining myself.

Maybe in the next life..

LL~