break mind

April 4th, 2025

It hurts to let go, but sometimes it hurts more to hold on.

She told me she wanted to try again. Her voice shook like a house in a storm. Words came anyway soft, unsure, like they didn't even believe themselves. I had no expectations, nothing was working. There was so much damage.

This was the first time I had seen her in over 9 days. I know, if it continued this way, it wasn't going to last.

"I want to love you. I just don't know how to stay."

How could she truly understand love? She raised herself, her mother didn't even stay.

"I can't love you the way I did at the beginning."

Ouch.

Do I deserve that? You have seen me at my worst? I was asking for too much. That was the issue, the thing…maybe she felt it I know I certainly did, always wanting more.

My fingers twitched as I hovered over her hand, the silence between her sentences that sounded like,

"Please don't give up on me, please don't abandon me like everyone else…"

And I was trying so hard to hold on.

I saw in her eyes, a deep ocean of ache, someone who has never been held, cared for, truly loved. Always expecting to be dropped. Left behind.

I loved her anyway. I loved her in the pauses, the pulling away. I loved her more than I loved myself. In the text that came after midnight only to vanish by morning. I loved her through her depression and her sad boy anthem.

The push. The pull..

        The start - stop

                    the stutter of her heart.

                                                                                        Trying to out run itself.

People love like fire.

She loved like smoke.

Always drifting, always fading, before I could hold her with both of my hands.

She'd show up in flashes.

A brush of a shoulder, a laugh too loud, a glance, that lingered too long.

Then she'd be gone, until she needed me again.

If I showed up for her, she'd be there for a short ride up the street, just long enough to steal my heart again. Never goodbye though. No explanation. Just space. Just time and silence.

Sadness and well,

                                                                                    me.

The nights were often silent while I'd stare at my phone, wondering what I'd done wrong for the 100th time, to be forgotten by the one who supposedly loved me. I knew better, shoved my instincts to the side and waited like a fool.

Her ghost didn't wear my face, older than me, colder than me, whispering in a voice I couldn't ever silence. Still, I stayed and waited. Like someone who had seen the light in her. She's left me in a just for a moment, her potential, her charisma, her passion for life and her love for me. She hugged me once, like she meant it.

Kissed me like she felt the magic.

Hands in my hair, body trembling, like secrets exposed.

When we pull apart, her eyes are glassy, haunted…

She was enough.

She whispered, "I can't give you the time you deserve. You deserve to be happy, Jamie."

I held her face… "you make me happy. I am fighting for us, for something, you. I want you again. Where did you go? Find yourself, please I'm still here waiting."

She was scared, terrified of how good it felt to be loved, terrified of relying on someone else to make them happy, terrified of actually needing me. It all fucking hurt. I can't lie. It hurt to love someone who once loved you back yet, wouldn't let it bloom.

Who had to "try" so hard to love me again.

                                                            Ouch again.

It hurt to be the only one making an effort, always disappointed, resentful, demanding…

Her heart didn't know how to land.

I tried so hard to be patient. Steady things. She never had to worry whether I would be there waiting for her. I always was.

                        JUST

There.

Most nights, I curled into myself and would cry into my pillow, or endlessly in the shower, trying to be an anchor. Deep into the darkness, the depths of the ocean, sinking, FAST. AND there she was just floating above me safe and sound.

Loving her was like reading a book. A beautiful book with missing pages. So, I filled the blank ones with hope, the missing ones with maybes and daydreams, with what ifs and the ending was never changing. I'd love her to the very end of my life.

She was always walking towards me and running away at the same time.

Maybe one day, she'll wake up with the weight of regret, heavy on her chest, maybe she will look up at the night sky, and miss me laying by her side.

And maybe she'll just keep running, never stopping long enough to realize what she did lose,

                            but me?