I loved you enough, to let you go.
a letter to the one I poured my heart out for
At this point, I don’t even remember where it all started.
It’s been so long since I have sat down and reminisced about you.
We were just 19.
sweet cinnamon lust.
burgeoning youth.
summer sweat.
making love to our favorite jazz albums.
in the consuming darkness of vulnerability.
Carpenters and Nat King Cole.
Blueberry cheesecakes.
flower pendants and love letters.
red was indeed the color of love.
oh, and how you still live on my mind, rent-free.
You have a chosen room there with beige curtains and minimalist portraits hanging on the wall.
You show up with the most beautiful smile in the mornings, with a cup of dark milk-blended coffee, sandwiches, and a peck on the forehead.
sometimes, a note hanging on the edge of the door.
“I am outside, in the hall. Call me, when you wake up.”
half-drunk beer bottles, leftover rice from last night.
Sharing toothbrushes, scattered pillows.
Neck kisses.
Bare-bodied kids.
and then, summer was gone.
fall arrived.
The lights gradually turned crimson.
The vivacity of red was fading out.
the skies turned clementine, like the hues of the setting sun.
and soon, it turned pale blue.
Something made your eyes go cold.
heartless, yet so full of feelings.
I knew it was time.
“Maybe it never existed at all”, you said.
Broken promises.
Spilled cups of coffee.
ashtrays filled to the brim.
The brush holder didn’t have space for two anymore.
note folders getting stacked with unsent letters and voice memos.
somehow resisting the urge to click on the send button.
sleepless, singing love songs at 3.
nights grew longer.
hours of shared laughter over video calls,
stopped, in the skip of a heartbeat.
apologies were left undone.
dreams unrealized.
like stale bacon on the breakfast plate.
and just like that, everything changed overnight.
Distinct polaroid memories are now strange and unwanted items.
tucked and forgotten in the overused diary that had once witnessed the warm fuzz of sharing ice colas, of exploring the city together.
like scribbles on the last page of a favorite notebook.
You just left.
like stardust.
and, I set you free.
god knows, I tried.
I chose your memories over the ‘home’ we thought we would build.
they say —
“the pain will numb down in a few days”
“Just give it some time. healing is never linear”
What does it even feel like to be ‘healed’?
Is it a ‘state of being’? am I healed enough to be existing?
or, will I ever be? maybe not.
I don’t know.
and maybe, things will get better
in another lifetime.
and maybe, we will cross paths then and, smile at each other.
maybe.
❤
~ N.
