The One that Got Away

I have never told the truth when it comes to you. I have beat around the bush so much if it was human it would be black and blue. I have run my hand over all the details and it came out muddy. I have tried washing my hands clean of you but your print keeps showing up. Stubborn and indelible. This here is a last resort. The last arrow in my quiver. I am desperately counting on the truth to set me free.

I don’t really remember the exact details of how we met. I just know we talked a lot, about nothing and everything. You called me a few days after, inebriated and depressed, telling me all about your troubles. That’s how I knew I wanted to help you. I was so messed up myself that I thought cleaning up your dirty laundry might somehow distract me from mine. I felt happy just listening to you talk about your anxiety, about the things that made you nervous. I liked discovering the root of your pain together with you. I remember laying awake in my bed trying to tackle your issues, thinking up a copying mechanism for you. I loved that my opinion mattered. The idea that you needed me fueled me on. 

Frantically, I searched for places where your happiness might be hiding. Sniffing the air for even a whiff of it. Checking for its prints like a forensic. I desperately wanted to be the one to present it to you. To please you. 

Searching. 

Obsessing. 

Searching. 

Obsessing. 

Falling. 

That’s how the mantra went on in my mind. How one goes from being an overachieving therapist to head over heels is chemistry I cannot explain. How two people so similar in all the bad ways could find attraction is physics even Newton cannot explain. 

So I fell, you fell and as most falls go, we had to deal with broken bones. We had a great time in our little shortlivedparadise. For us forever was twenty days. It’s funny how we both knew it would never last but the end still slapped hard anyway. I still feel like our window closed too early though. You stopped needing me so fast that I felt cheated. 

I miss you. Do you think of me sometimes?

Love was hard but the friendship came so easy. I know I have no right to feel cheated because I’m the one who ran, but feelings don’t work with logic. I hate feeling this way and Idon’t know how to stop. I now know that the only reason wedidn’t repel is because depression stubbornly held us together like gorilla glue. Ours wasn’t a collision but an intersection of traumas. 

Despite this twisted narration of our time together, I still hope there was a crack in that window of opportunity. A loophole, I don’t know. Just something. I just need an excuse to come back to you. I know none of this makes sense and following my train of thought is somewhat a fool’s errand. It’s just my way of saying I am tired.

I am tired of the reasons we can’t be together.  I’m sick of the precautions. 

I just want to be with you. 

All this time I thought I was running from you. God knows I ran as fast as I could.

 So fast my legs got weary and wobbly. 

 So weary I couldn’t keep it up anymore. 

 So I finally looked down and realized I was running on a treadmill. 

       I never really left. I just wore myself down. 

 So worn down that I’m sending you this disclaimer: 

 I’m coming for you. 

 With all I have. 

 I can’t be responsible for your happiness,

But,

Can we, hurt together?  

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