A Back to the Door

I sat on the steps to his apartment . I had my back turned to the door. Some weird fengshui in my mind told me that having my back turned towards it gave me some kind of power. The power I felt I'd lost when he took the keys from me and told me to leave just days earlier. For the last four days my mind had been steaming with the heat of regret. Why do things always happen like this? The more we love each other in this world, the more cruel we become. I suppose it was because we were getting comfortable. When you fall into that place its all too easy to forget that someone could still choose to walk away at any time. I don’t know if its healthy , or anything to be remotely proud of, but I was no quitter when it came to love. Little did I know that that would be my downfall. Each time we spoke to each other from this place of accidental cruelty, coming back just wasn’t the same. It was a small chip of my confidence. A brittle chunk of my soul falling away from me. It was the memories which kept me overly optimistic. Most people would advise “think of all of the bad things and it will be so much easier to move on." I was a sucker who you could flip a coin towards optimism every time. Was it not worth it though ? To me those beautiful , fragile and unique moments of intimacy and trust far outweighed an argument here and there. I guess in a world of humans stuck on survive, control and ego often win over love and vulnerability. Its how we tend to survive.

I heard the door slowly open, but could not bare to look. This would be the last time. A last glance, a last exchange of words, and my hopefulness of one last touch. I wasn't ready for it to be the end. Two cloth bags gently dropped to my side as he appeared like a ghost from a dream.

I looked up , still refusing to stand. "I am not going to come to your level" I thought inside of my head . "At least not this time . " Even though I should be so angry with him, I had a glimmer of a thought. My hopeless hope shimmering behind a serious exterior. I tried to stay composed.

"I wonder if one last hug would be too much , too desperate." My little voice suggested. I pushed it back down. “ Don’t be weak…” my inner ego burst in my ear. I grabbed the bags briefly glancing at its contents. "That should be everything . Let me know if its not” He explained , as it anything in those bags held more value to me than this unpredictably predictable ending .... “Anyways, I have to go ." His face had lost its warmth. Its softness. Without the glow of love I was used to seeing in those eyes, he was almost unrecognisable to me anymore. He began making his way away from me down the street , away from the apartment….further and further from my heart. I felt a crippling anxiety of needing to do, to say anything to change the ending. I wasn't ready . This wasn't as I had pictured it. "Wait !!!!!" He turned sharply and looked at me with those blank loveless eyes. "say something !Anything !" my heart commanded. "Do you want some company." I managed to squeeze from under my breath, a slight less than a whisper.

He paused for a moment and weighed the best answer in his mind. After seconds which seemed like forever’s , he replied with a soft apologetic tone "Sorry, I just want to be alone "

That makes one of us. He kept walking further away from myself and those bags,until he faded away to nothing, like our love had done over the course of some immeasurable time.