This time I will let you go.
I’ll turn my back and walk away. And for the first time in my life, I won’t hope that you’ll come running after me, screaming, begging me to stay.
I know the beginning will be hard, I’m no fool. I’ll sob my eyes out for weeks, chain-smoking and shrinking my waist because even the thought of food will make my stomach turn. I’ll dress up and go to the bar with my friends, but probably just end up hiding in the bathroom while my tears threaten to drown me. I bet I’ll even welcome the loneliness with open arms and allow it to swallow me whole this time.
Because, the thing is, I’m tired of pretending your role in my life is something it’s not.
I’m tired of giving you my heart just to watch you take a blade to it. I’ve exhausted myself trying to think of times when I truly felt loved by you. Even in an alternate universe, I don’t think you were ever really mine.
And I’m tired.
I’m tired of never being good enough for you. Tired of never being what you wanted.
I’m tired of all the lame attempts I’ve made to be more like the other girls you’d find yourself in bed with, whiskey on your breath. I’m tired of the fighting, and the screaming, and the crying. My tongue and cheeks have become a collage of bite marks from all the times I’ve tried to stay quiet.
I’m tired of loving too hard. Tired of my love not being enough.
Tired of watching you trip over your words when trying to make excuses for why you had two pillows on your bed after a night we spent apart when I know you always only slept with one. I’m tired of thinking I knew you and understood you when in reality I didn’t know or understand anything about you at all.
I’ll eat takeout leftovers for six days straight. Watch Remember Me on repeat until I go cross-eyed. Read every Bukowski poem I can get my hands on. Ignore the fact that breathing human bodies are much better at keeping me warm at night than pillows and blankets in an empty bed.
But I need to let you go.
I need to leave you because this isn’t healthy for me. Because my wounds keep getting deeper before they even have a chance to heal. Because I’ve given you enough of me that I don’t even know who I am anymore. And most importantly, because you didn’t even care enough to try to keep me in one piece.
I need to leave you because you don’t know how to stay.
I need to leave you because you never wanted me to stay.
So, this time I’ll let you go. And this time I’ll actually mean it.
Featured image via Andy Vu on Pexels
