(Also posted at IndieInk, April 2010.)
Soon after we started, I told him that I was wounded – that I was damaged – that I was broken. He laughed it off, telling me that I was ridiculous – that I was fine and it was all in my head. But I knew better. I knew that I was not approaching decisions the same way that I had always approached them in the past, that my objectivity was compromised, that all logic had departed. I knew that when no one was looking, when no one was around, I still cried myself to sleep, and that, in those moments, I felt like I was barely keeping it together, like a shattered ceramic figurine, pieced back together and held in place with Scotch tape and Elmer’s glue. I knew that my heart was not listening to my head, and my body was ignoring both of them. Mostly though, I knew that I needed things that I had never needed from anyone before, and that they were the same things that he knew that he wouldn’t be able to give to me, maybe to anyone.
I suppose that somewhere along the way, I made up my mind that, if you care about each other enough, then the hardest part of the relationship is making the decision to stay. And to be quite frank, I’m still not sure that I disagree with that sentiment. But in this case, I approached the relationship like a challenge: I knew everything about the whole situation was wrong, and I made the conscious decision to stay. No – more than that – I made the conscious decision to disappear in him.
In fleeting moments of clarity, I knew that we were just using each other, hiding our pain in each other. And yet, I stayed. I stayed, even though I was almost certain that I didn’t love him. I stayed because he was more broken than I. I stayed because in my confused state, it felt like we could fix each other if we just tried hard enough. Or that I could fix myself if I could just be enough to make him happy.
The funny thing is that I probably would have stayed longer if he’d have let me. And to give credit where credit is due, he finally saw through my charade enough to push me away that one final time. But even now, I get a twinge of feeling that if I could only have done more, given more, been more, that maybe, just maybe, we could have worked – that I could have figured out the way to make it work. And that perhaps I could have found some small personal happiness in striving to make him happy. It’s in those moments that I am most keenly aware of just how broken I still am.
Friday, March 26, 2010
Monday, December 7, 2009
Reflections
(Originally posted at IndieInk, December 2009.)
I don’t know if it’s the weather or the time of year or some combination, or if it’s even any of those things as much as it’s just me, but for some reason I can’t get you off my mind tonight. The cold air, the soaking rain, the reflection of the holiday lights in the black puddles on the pavement all conspire to remind me of that last night. The night that I dressed up in my black wrap dress, wearing the necklace that your mother gave to me the previous weekend, wrapped myself up in my cornflower blue wool coat, and headed out into the cold and damp night, warmed by thoughts of you. The night that I looked at you from across the restaurant, closed my umbrella, and smiled, not knowing what heartbreak was lying in wait for me on the other side of the room.
I don’t know if you know how you broke me. I am, however, certain that I never told you. I never said how I stopped being able to listen to that song that you used to play for me, over and over again, while we’d lie in bed. I never said that I went from cursing god to thanking him for you to cursing him again. I never said that despite all the tragedies I’ve encountered, both large and small, losing you was the metaphorical last straw, the thing that pushed me over the edge into the abyss from which I struggle to escape every single day. Although, in retrospect, maybe I never said any of these things because they’re not true, even if they feel true on a night like tonight.
I don’t know why you came back, all those months later, telling me that you loved me then, that you loved me still. And after that I imagined that you would eventually grab me and kiss me and tell me that it was all going to be okay, that we could make it work, somewhere, somehow. But you never did, and I’ve grown tired of waiting. Would it have made it all better? Would it have made me all better?
I don’t know.
I don’t know if it’s the weather or the time of year or some combination, or if it’s even any of those things as much as it’s just me, but for some reason I can’t get you off my mind tonight. The cold air, the soaking rain, the reflection of the holiday lights in the black puddles on the pavement all conspire to remind me of that last night. The night that I dressed up in my black wrap dress, wearing the necklace that your mother gave to me the previous weekend, wrapped myself up in my cornflower blue wool coat, and headed out into the cold and damp night, warmed by thoughts of you. The night that I looked at you from across the restaurant, closed my umbrella, and smiled, not knowing what heartbreak was lying in wait for me on the other side of the room.
I don’t know if you know how you broke me. I am, however, certain that I never told you. I never said how I stopped being able to listen to that song that you used to play for me, over and over again, while we’d lie in bed. I never said that I went from cursing god to thanking him for you to cursing him again. I never said that despite all the tragedies I’ve encountered, both large and small, losing you was the metaphorical last straw, the thing that pushed me over the edge into the abyss from which I struggle to escape every single day. Although, in retrospect, maybe I never said any of these things because they’re not true, even if they feel true on a night like tonight.
I don’t know why you came back, all those months later, telling me that you loved me then, that you loved me still. And after that I imagined that you would eventually grab me and kiss me and tell me that it was all going to be okay, that we could make it work, somewhere, somehow. But you never did, and I’ve grown tired of waiting. Would it have made it all better? Would it have made me all better?
I don’t know.
Wednesday, November 29, 2006
Vows are Spoken to be Broken
(Originally posted at Ruined Music, November, 2006.)
It seems like a billion years ago now, but once upon a time, way back in 1990, I was a freshman in high school. And like a lot of freshmen, I was completely smitten with a senior. He was smart, sarcastic, and artsy. He listened to British synth pop music, bands like Erasure and the Cure. He always wore a black trench coat. Mostly, though, he was eighteen and he had a car – unlike me. I had recently turned fourteen and, for all intents and purposes, I was still a little girl.
So, there I was, this naïve little freshman, wondering what it would be like to date this seemingly mature senior. And boy, did I try to get his attention. I chased after him for months. I started wearing black. I wrote poetry. I became my mother’s worst nightmare. Finally, on Valentine’s Day, I decided to do something about my crush. I scraped together enough of my babysitting money to get him something really sentimental – in this case, a cassette single of Depeche Mode’s “Enjoy the Silence.” You know, because “feelings are intense / words are trivial.”
Our high school had this thing where, for Valentine’s Day, you could send someone a rose. And quite surprisingly, he sent me one. Only the note attached to the flower said, “Hey you. So, I suppose you want me to write some kind of witty repartee or shit like that, right? Well tough, chick. With inky sentiments.”
I was perplexed. What kind of romantic gesture was that?
That night he came over to my house, and – instead of going back to my bedroom like he anticipated – we wound up taking a long walk around my very small neighborhood. At the end of the night he gave me all the classic lines – “You’re so young,” and “you’re so sweet and innocent,” and “I’m leaving for college in a couple of months.” Blah, blah, blah.
Of course, a day or so later, I found out that he had hooked up with several of my friends. He cut and ran when he realized that it wouldn’t be so easy with me; he made his escape before I figured him all out. So now every time I hear that song I think of this, and I thank my lucky stars that I only had to be fourteen for one year.
It seems like a billion years ago now, but once upon a time, way back in 1990, I was a freshman in high school. And like a lot of freshmen, I was completely smitten with a senior. He was smart, sarcastic, and artsy. He listened to British synth pop music, bands like Erasure and the Cure. He always wore a black trench coat. Mostly, though, he was eighteen and he had a car – unlike me. I had recently turned fourteen and, for all intents and purposes, I was still a little girl.
So, there I was, this naïve little freshman, wondering what it would be like to date this seemingly mature senior. And boy, did I try to get his attention. I chased after him for months. I started wearing black. I wrote poetry. I became my mother’s worst nightmare. Finally, on Valentine’s Day, I decided to do something about my crush. I scraped together enough of my babysitting money to get him something really sentimental – in this case, a cassette single of Depeche Mode’s “Enjoy the Silence.” You know, because “feelings are intense / words are trivial.”
Our high school had this thing where, for Valentine’s Day, you could send someone a rose. And quite surprisingly, he sent me one. Only the note attached to the flower said, “Hey you. So, I suppose you want me to write some kind of witty repartee or shit like that, right? Well tough, chick. With inky sentiments.”
I was perplexed. What kind of romantic gesture was that?
That night he came over to my house, and – instead of going back to my bedroom like he anticipated – we wound up taking a long walk around my very small neighborhood. At the end of the night he gave me all the classic lines – “You’re so young,” and “you’re so sweet and innocent,” and “I’m leaving for college in a couple of months.” Blah, blah, blah.
Of course, a day or so later, I found out that he had hooked up with several of my friends. He cut and ran when he realized that it wouldn’t be so easy with me; he made his escape before I figured him all out. So now every time I hear that song I think of this, and I thank my lucky stars that I only had to be fourteen for one year.
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