What He Should Have Told Her

He told her that their thoughts were trapped, and forever lost in their once childhood dreams. He said that the years in between had stolen their promises and distorted the way his heart once sought hers out. He just couldn’t wait anymore. He had stopped dreaming of her a few years back. He said that he had found someone new, and he hoarsely whispered that she was more like him.

His heart had simply forgotten hers, and it was not her fault. He said that perhaps too much time had passed, and too much distance had turned them into strangers to one another. He reminded her of their foolish promises on a playground that no longer appealed to him, and that he could barely remember what they had once swore to each other.

He told her that they were merely the dreams of two innocent, foolish, starry-eyed, unwise and stupid children whose journeys had taken them away from one another, as was always an inevitable part of the universe’s divine plan. He asked her not to call him again, and he begged her to forget their so-called love, and carry on as though he never was, and they never were. He said that she should see the world and chase her dreams, without him. She should go in search of a love that would have to love her more than she could ever love him. He wanted her to settle in the little white house on the hill she had dreamed of as a child, where she would sit by a window, and dream of naming her babies. He told her to forget him, just as he had forgotten her a long time ago.

But what he should have told her was, that the breaths he was taking in this world was fast running out, and that his new breaths would soon begin in a whole other world. One he didn’t quite understand, and one he feared almost as much as losing her. He should have said that he could not bear to have her see him like that, and that he had never wanted to utter unkind words to her, or break his promise, or her heart.

Even if he had whispered it, he should have told her that his days were being counted, while hers would carry on long after he had left. He never told her of his long fight, or how hard and bravely he fought just to be right there for her when she finally returned home to him. What he should have told her was that he had waited for her, and how ironically it had turned out that he had waited for her, for his entire life.

He never meant to say goodbye with what seemed to be with no feeling at all. He never meant to betray the promises he could vividly remember, and once swore to her. He just could not give her a better reason for living his lie. He didn’t want to tell her about how he was painfully living their memories of so long ago, while he waited for the day his eyes would close one last time. He never wanted her to know what he already knew that his fight was for nothing, and that he was tired.

He was exhausted, and he was in pain. Even though he was never any good at playing it cool, it was their beautiful moments that he found his courage in. What he should have told her was that while he was living in his own little world; one she would never know of, she would forever be the one that his heart would recognize. What he should have told her was that she should listen more closely and hear what he isn’t saying, as he tells her how he no longer loves her, and that he perhaps never did. That when the rain begins to fall, it was her he would stop to remember for a moment longer than he should.

He should have told her how he wears his pain like a heavy coat around him, and that it is her face he sees, her smile he finds, and her eyes he searches for in everyone else. What he should have told her was that he was about to die too young, and that death was about to steal all the remaining pages from their chapter, in a book that began almost thirty years ago. What he should have told her was that their story was only about to begin, and that he would love her from the other side of the stars, especially when he hears her laughing in the rain, or as she has her arms around another, or while she cradles her child in her arms.

What he should have told her was that even though she pledged her heart to him a long time ago, she would be all right without him, because he would watch her, hold her, love her and miss her, from the other side.