Not So Mutual Endings -1/1- openxopen
It was mutual wasn’t it? These feelings we had for each other. They came to an end along the same path. Didn’t they? A mutual end. Or so I had thought.
Two lives crossed and split like railroad tracks heading in opposite directions.
We were never meant to stay together. Yet, why do I still find myself longing for your soft touches, the warm kisses, the quiet whispers in the dark. Why do I miss your smile, your eyes, and my hand in yours? Our love was never open. You never wanted those closest to you to know, but I was fine with that. I told you I didn’t care who knew, as long as you did. That wasn’t what brought along our end though. No, it was much more than that.
“What am I to you?”
That question stared back at me on the screen of the phone in my hand. What used to be so clear was now a question in my own head. Were you my lover? My best friend? Or something entirely different? I didn’t even know anymore.
“You’re just a friend.”
I thought my words were right as I typed them out to you. Was I wrong? Did I chicken out in my decision to cut our ties for the second time?
Do you remember how it was you who left me alone the first time? “I think you like me more than I like you.” Those words made me cry myself to sleep for weeks. But yet I stayed in contact with you. Our conversations lasted for hours, both of us equally interested and entertained. Eventually I won you back. I was safe again within your arms. I felt right at home.
Time went on and we grew. No longer were we the timid pair blushing at every stray touch and kissing with tense postures. We relaxed into each other. We were one in the same. We couldn’t get enough of each other.
But our paths came to a fork in the road. We couldn’t take the same road, and we had to part. It was a hard decision to make but it was made for us. Atleast partly.
It was my turn to take you back that second time, but even then we knew our foundation had cracked, our base had shifted. We were no longer the strong couple we once were.
We didn’t last long after that. Our feelings had dried up like a puddle in the summer heat. Perhaps our love was only a storm, drenching the ground, nourishing it and making it grow, but once the rains ceased and the heat rose, our nourishing was for nothing. The greens we nurtured perished to an earthy brown that crumbled beneath our fingertips. Our love was just dust scattered along the wind now.
Though I came to realize it wasn't a mutual end. My feelings seemed to end even before we said we were done, but yours continued. You tried your best to replant the seeds, but your attention to them was smothering and instead of being the sun they needed you became the darkness that they shied from. You, the master gardener, ran into a plant you could not grow.
Our mutual end was not mutual at all. I, the one who had decided upon the end, was having second thoughts, but not when I rushed it to an end. No. I was having them months afterwards when loneliness was gnawing at my bones making me need to feel wanted. I was always wanted with you and I knew you still wanted me, but I had to stay strong. I couldn’t take one step forward and two steps back into your arms. I had to force myself to think past the attention I craved to another mindset. I had to look past how I missed your body pulled against mine as we slept together. I had to look past the way your milky skin looked littered with the love bites that marked you as my own. I had to look past it all.
You were no longer healthy for me. You still aren’t.
Stop lurking so near in my mind.
My memories of you were buried and gone months ago.
Stop resurrecting them. They are lifeless things that should mean nothing to me.
Maybe one day I can thank you for being my first love. Maybe one day I can look you in the eye and smile, but for now stop tormenting me.
I’m begging you.
Please.