You and Your Long Goodbye

The trick is to reach the door first. Slam it HARD and let it hurt and then nothing hurts after that. You and your long goodbye. You and your reasons. Somewhere in that cold dark state of empty that you left for me, I can make out the crystalline fragments of another life. I pick them up, one by one, and bring them to my well-lit table. This can’t be good, I don’t remember these! A midnight drive to Galway Bay. A lighthouse down in Key Biscayne. I was happy?

I was… happy.

And then the cold set in. And I forgot myself or did I outgrow it? A lifetime later and you still don’t even know my name. But it isn’t your indifference that gets me. It’s the sheer vastness of time and how it folds back onto itself, knocking on our door like a drunk census-taker. How many plans did you have? And how many sleepless nights? And how many broken hearts did you say, not the names, please, just a total.

GET THE FUCK OUT OF MY HOUSE!

I slam the door. I breathe. My hand is a fractured geode that once held the earth. And now it holds a key and a map and some fragments from a place I don’t remember.

But surely, I must have soared at times? I must have reached and taken hold. I must have run fast, my chestnut hair chasing after and my eyes must have shone brilliant in staggeringly beautiful azure hues.

#relationships #endings