‴ Wild Flower

eleven

IT FELT LIKE A DREAM— probably the hardest thing I ever did. Leaving everything behind, finally taking my bags and leaving Cambridge.

That's what I always dreamed of, but it felt strange now. Almost like I felt regret. Like I don't want to.

Cambridge was always quiet. Even when it wasn't.

There was something about it, it was that kind of city.

It wasn't home, but at the same time, it was.
It was weird. I didn't had many friends, didn't had a stable home or family, but it was mine. It was where I grew up. Where my broken home stood.

Cambridge had this vibe. Always empty and mysterious, like a place frozen in time.

It was a city that made you feel special, but not in the way London did. London made you feel small, like the world was too big to hold in your hands. Cambridge was warmth, even when it was cold.

And now I was gone.

I wanted this. I needed this. My own life, my own place, far away from everything I knew. But leaving was hard. Harder than I thought it would be.

I thought about my mother. My siblings.

My little sister. I left her behind.

She was too young for this. Too young to have to learn how to live with someone like him.

Now she have to handle it alone, just like I did.

I always took it on myself, always defended her, because she don't deserve it.

I should've feel relieved. That was the whole point, I was supposed to leave. To get out. To start over.

But the guilt didn't left my mind. Because I knew what it felt like to be a young girl in that house with him.

And now she would be alone in it.

It was hard. I tried to convince myself that I deserve it. That for once I need to choose myself. It was painful.

The moving day had passed too fast. Signing papers, last minute errands, the drive to London. It was all so quick, so overwhelming. Tristan did most of the heavy lifting. I folded clothes, stacked books, placed things carefully where they belonged.

I thought I would be excited, relieved maybe.
But all I could feel inside me was a strange panic.
I hated to ruin that day for me. Because I was tired of feeling this way, making this experience sad.

I felt like a child playing house.

I didn't felt connected to the apartment. Not yet.

I kept waiting for it to sink in, for the warmth of it to settle into my bones, but it didn't. It was beautiful, small and soft and gentle, just the way I liked things. But it still felt like I was standing in someone else's life, like I had walked into a place that wasn't mine.

Maybe it was because I had spent so long in that house, in that city. Maybe leaving Cambridge had been harder than I let myself admit. It wasn't that I had a happy life there. I didn't. But it was mine.

My house was empty and cold and full of ghosts, but it was the only thing I had ever known. The streets were quiet and old and filled with too many memories, but they had been mine to walk through.

But Tristan still made it look easy. Like moving in with someone wasn't a big deal at all. Like it was something he'd done a thousand times before.

He walked around the apartment with his phone pressed to his ear, voice low and focused, talking about numbers or meetings or clients, I watched him from the little space near the kitchen, sitting cross legged on the floor, pretending to organize a drawer that was already empty.