a 21st century lover

lock the door

lock the door - March 13, 2024 

I imagine it must hurt the way it hurt me. To feel abandoned when you left the front door open on your way out and I didn't run after you. Thinking you would come back home, I leave that door unlocked. Leave it untouched. Let my home be ransacked and trespassed by strangers. Been robbed of possessions that I could care less about. My living room is barren. My kitchen is scattered and riddled with broken porcelain. Yet, I still stay, waiting for what I know will never come.

And when I cover one of my eyes, I almost see what this home was like before. Filled with precious photos and was not so dead and dull. See you come down the stairs, rushing on ahead and kissing me goodbye while you go out the door. And always forget to lock the door. Then, I peek through the other eye and see what was not so heartwarming. I see the arguments. I see the abuse. I see no love in your eyes. And when I look at myself, what I saw was not me. I saw a man who had been bruised. A tired romantic. A heart so broken that it hung itself. What a sad sight it was. What a sad sight I am. I, who had felt devoted, unconditional love for you, can no longer feel. My heartache and urge to cry feel numbed and dead. My anger is drowned out by this wave of listlessness. I just keep watching you beat and bruise me till I die. See my soul and life from my face kill itself. Watch as I start to disassociate from the conversation into nothing.

This house has nothing anymore. Still, I sit and wait. Sit on the floor and watch the door to see if you will come home. It's nothing more than a pipe dream but I had some hope you loved me still. Loved me enough that you would come home soon in just a few days. A few weeks. Months. Wait as the sky turns off and on, flashing its light in my face. Make it that those years of abuse and painful moments together were not for naught. That you did it out of love for me. I can't already be erased from your memories. Tell me that you didn't fall out of love with me. Let you meet my family and have them love you more than me. Have me drop the friends from day one because you didn't trust them. Follow you around, dragging myself to wherever and doing whatever you wanted. I'm so tired of it all. Left all that was good for me for a chance to make you happy. Sold all of my happiness and values to build a new life that you were so desperate to abandon once you got everything you wanted out of it. Good for you, then. Played me good, didn't you? Felt good that you left me in a state where I had nothing and no one except you to rely on. And then, you left. You left, goddamn it. I sold my soul to you for you to have. Didn't know that you were such a devil to toy me to your whims.

So this is it, then. I am reduced to nothing but a hollow husk of myself who has nothing better to do than to watch that door. The door remains unlocked for you. I'll wait for you to open the door. Open the door and see me hanging with my heart bled out of me. My corpse looked no different from me when we would argue for hours on end. See me dead like you always wanted. Died for a love I never should've entertained. I guess I should've just locked the door when I was still alive.