The Ending
I miss you. Thank you for being someone who gave me space to love with abandon. To love so fiercely and with so much of my heart. That’s why it still hurts so much that you chose to walk away. All that love pouring out of me with no where to go. That’s what they say grief is, right?
Whilst I understand your decision, it seems crazy to me how fine you seem. I know that you have tendencies to repress emotions but it still cut deep to see how well you took to the absence of me.
And maybe you’re not. I think emotions affect you more than you care to be honest with yourself.
I think the main reason that drove you to make the decision of breaking up was that I had made you feel unsafe in the relationship – for the first time. I don’t think you knew how to handle it and so you did the one thing you could control, which was to eradicate the thing that had made you feel unsafe.
But none of that matters, they are only narratives I am building in my head to help make sense of the grief that I still feel. Because only a crazy person, in my mind, would throw away a relationship as good as we had it.
The silence between us is growing quieter. The hurt grows slightly more calm day by day but never fully away. At least not yet. Maybe one day.
The Grief
I don’t remember the last time I cried this much for this long. Every time I think I can no longer cry anymore, I somehow do. With every tear that’s shed, the weight sinks down in my heart into my stomach, wrenching it until it’s twist beyond recognition. At some point these tears will become a river which will become a whirlpool that threatens to swallow me whole. I can feel it tug at my skin, drawing me downwards into it’s comforting abyss. There is no light there, everything lost into the void.
But I cannot, will not go.
These tears can become scars on my heart, to go alongside the ones from tears before. They will become my battle scars of the wars that I’ve fought with grief. The wars that I’ve won, my presence and joys to show for it.
I will wear warpaint mixed up from tears and the dust that’s settled from previous fights. My sobs will become my war-cry. Embracing the pain will become my strength.
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I chose this path in order to feel. I did not want to be numb anymore, but I forgot what it meant to feel like an exposed nerve.
All of the kisses, all of the laughs, the gentle moments, the less gentle moments. Is this heartbreak worth it for all of that? It is, but I just wish that there had been time for more. Even though we squeezed as much as we could out of the moments we had, all I want to do is to slide back into that blissful cocoon that was our world. Where love, understanding and rejoicing in each other was the language that we shared.
I want more time with that beautiful smile that lights up your face and makes my heart skip a beat. I want more time feeling the gentle way you kiss me. I want more time being silly and goofy with you. And even more time skin on skin.
Even though I knew there was the high possibility that this relationship would end because you wanted to pursue monogamy, I just hoped you would know how rare it is to be able to find a dynamic like ours. The fifteen months we were dating flew by and when I look through the photos and messages we shared, we did so much, in so many different areas. And we got on like a house on fire in everything we did, maybe that’s why it all burned down. In the end, if none of that meant enough for you to try and protect it, then I was a fool for hoping you would.
You had found someone who was good to you, who tried to give you as much as possible, that you could openly confide in with your thoughts and feelings. Who asked very little other than to be able to spend time with you. And you threw it all away. I hope it’ll all be worth it. Because I don’t know if I’ll be here if you came back looking for me.
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I hate your stupid face. The sad look in your eyes when we last spoke. Your soft tone when you told me you no longer wanted to be with me despite still being in love with me. I hate the way you listened to me but refused to actually hear what I was saying. I hate the stupid way you decide one thing and won’t change your mind. Even if it’s stupid. And it makes no sense.
I hate the stupid way you go seeking space and not realising why and that it’s probably not what you want. I hate how stupid you are, never realising that I could’ve been everything for you. I hate how I’m resorting to calling you stupid just so I can be angry at you, because I’ve been struggling to feel that way.
This is all so stupid and I hate it.
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I really hope it all falls to shit. We get told we shouldn’t be spiteful but why not. When the person who hurt you is clearly blinded by their own ill-advised conviction. I hope it all falls to pieces and then you realise what a mistake it all was. To finally see our relationship in the same light that I saw it – one in a million. And I hope that it will dawn on you how stupid it was that you just let it go. I hope you can admit that it was an error of judgement. And I hope that it will soothe my age old wound, that will no longer have a hold on me.
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I realise all the dates I’m going on. The people I’m meeting. They’re helping as a distraction from the pain I feel. But in reality, all I’m doing, is trying to find you. And that hurts to realise.
I wish I could kill this side of me that holds these feelings for you. So that I no longer feel like this. So I can move on. So I can be friends with you.
The Love
291 days of knowing you and everyday that I do, I’m so grateful for having got to meet you at all.
I’m not one to believe in fate or destiny but it still blows my mind the chain of happy coincidences that led to us meeting. Even before that when we were just texting, there was always something about you that I felt drawn to, a magnetic pull almost.
291 days later since that day I bumped into you at the Chinese supermarket, I still remember the moment I spotted you, did a double take and locked eyes with you. I knew in that instant that I wanted to know you, felt a connection with you, even though we were complete strangers.
I have a habit of being overly optimistic and falling head over heels for people for them to let me down. No matter how much hope I place on you, who you are and our relationship, you exceed them always. Thank you for giving me your efforts and time in a way that makes me feel loved and seen.
It blows my mind that someone as amazing as you loves me the way that you do. I still find it hard to wrap my head around it all some times. You’re fiercely smart, gentle (and also not, at the right times), kind, fun, inspirational. I can’t help but feel drawn to you at all times, even when you’re being a dick at mario karts.
The trips and times we’ve spent together have been some of the best memories of my year. Thank you for uplifting my life. I love how we can enjoy so many different avenues of life together all with a joke and a laugh.
291 days of loving you, and I hope we have many more together.
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So delicate and delicious in equal measure.
The way your eyes lit up when I handed you the tiny crane I’d folded out of the gold chocolate wrapper. The hint of a smile dancing on your lips as you declared “No, it doesn’t look like a swan, it looks like a dragon”.
How preciously you held it in your hand as we left the restaurant and walked back to yours.
In that moment, you may as well have been holding my heart.
The “I Miss You”s
Is it ever simple to say I miss you?
One little phrase to encompass the yearning I feel for you. For your smile, your smell, your touch, your lips. In still moments, my imagination tried to conjure you. It can try but it could never do you justice.
The flashes of the past brings me a whisper of the joy felt in that moment but only tickles the aching hunger that I feel in every cell. I miss you (so much).
Such a loaded phrase taking the form of three short words. What I really mean to say is:
“I wish you were here”
“I wish we didn’t have to part”
“I can’t wait to see each other again”
All those desires baked into just three words.
How could it possibly convey the gratitude I have for having you in my life. You took a part of me with you when you left but in exchange I got to rejoice in who you are, your ghost to keep me company until we meet again.
And so, I’ll carry you with me, in the day to day, in the sunshine, in the cold, dark nights.
All I can hope is sometimes you think of me too.
And here I end with the little words, I miss you.
The Effect
I feel like a car jumpstarted. Having been sitting in a junkyard resigned to my fate. Out of nowhere, your energy hits me. It’s electrifying and all-consuming.
The person who I thought was lost and lay gone, you’ve shone a light on her – she’s well and alive. Her reckless whirlwind of energy no less than it was before; perhaps she had always been here, just dormant. You’ve released the raw force of her nature and I feel unbound, untethered. Am I scared or excited at the notion of being swept away? Whichever it is, the emotion is overwhelming, it engulfs me until I no longer know what’s me and what’s her. The wisdoms I’ve learned since I last knew her, will they allow me to harness the power or will she wreck me – another mess in her shipyard.
The Start
Exploring this new uncharted territory of dating whilst being engaged, I thought I was just supplementing my primary relationship. I wanted to meet interesting people, but I didn’t think I’d meet someone like you. Perhaps a little part of me had always hoped?
You intrigued me from the get go, your vibrant intelligence comes across so strongly. The multi-sides of you that is quiet and pensive as well as boisterous and rogue. You’re the first person who I’ve met that reminds me of me. An explorer, an adventurer, who wants to see it all and do it all. The best thing about you is that you make it happen.
And even though I hate long distance relationships, that is currently what we’re in right now, I still find myself falling so hard for you. Something I never thought would be possible. Perhaps it’s a mix of the circumstances along with some personal growth.
The idea of you meeting someone who you want to pursue a monogamous relationship with, scares me. And it’s made me realise that, although it was not my intention, I’ve been playing for keeps. What a fool I am.
AChinaSoul 