It's 2AM and the week of finals, so I didn't proofread this completely. Apologies for any mistakes before I go back and look it over again.
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I spent hours upon hours laying in our former bed imagining what it would be like to see her again. I assumed it would be under some poignant, magnificent circumstances. She would waltz back into my life as if she had never left, which unknown to her she hadn't, and see all the progress I had made in the past month. All I had to do was fill my mind with her and I wouldn't think about imperfection. I was even testing myself now. I would leave my books scattered around the living room and see how long I could go without picking them up. 2 days was my current record and it made my heart swell so much I could get "2 DAYS" as a fucking tattoo below the swallows adorning my chest to prove how far I had come. I wasn't completely normal, but I was on a barren pathway filled with lonely hours of self torment that was leading me to a place I had full faith would make me whole. A place that would draw her back to me, my mind added.
However, I never once imagined our perfect reunion of two swirling imperfect galaxies that had once melded into a universe filled with soul crushing love and adoration would happen on the lawn and garden isle of the supermarket early on a Saturday. Nor did I ever once consider she would be here with him and would be wearing those grey sweatpants that hung low on her wide hips that she wore on the plane to our trip to Mexico when I buried myself deep within her body, mind, and soul in the plane bathroom, and the one in the airport during our excessive layover. She looked as if she'd just climbed out of bed with him and still managed to look heartbreakingly beautiful. I swore the lanky, teenage cashier could hear my already shattered heart slipping from my broken chest onto the unforgiving floor.
The absolute love of my life that was etched into every inch of my being and the only person to accept my disorder, even if it was what ultimately drove her away, was looking into the eyes of a man the same way she used to look at me. Her eyes had the glow that could light up a whole village and her smile could warm even the coldest of souls, just as it had done to mine. I was spending every waking second working towards getting back someone who was giving her love away to another man.
A man who wasn't drinking in her presence, carefully assessing just how far apart her eyes were or that her two front teeth weren't exactly symmetrical, but rather shot her a lukewarm grin and went back to look at fertilizers. He had the one perfect being on this earth standing in front of him with nothing but affection in her eyes and all he did was look at lawn supplies.
As if she was finally feeling to pull of the magnet that I couldn't seem to escape, she looked in my direction and the look in her eyes faded. She looked as if she was staring at a ghost of a distant life lived by another person and I did nothing to change her mind. I had written pages upon pages in my journal of speeches I had prepared to give her when we finally were together, but they all seemed futile and pointless when all I wanted to do was soak up her sunshine that was like the first warm day after the harshest of winters.
"Hi," she finally spoke in the voice that changed my life so long ago. I had been so paralyzed by her I didn't notice she had left the indifferent man to come over to me. Her big eyes held a look filled with wonder.
"Hi," I breathlessly whispered. Just seeing her crooked mouth forming words directed at me made me winded. I couldn't breathe and was sure my chest was going to cave in and join my heart on the floor.
"How...are yo...have you been...did you..." she flustered. She was never flustered. My perfect angel was never one to be caught on words. Only once, when she was destroying me, did she not ponder her mind for the perfect way to ask the most mundane questions. But her she was in front of my unable to put together a full sentence or even use words more elegant that basic linguistics.
"Harry, you don't seem to grasp what words can do," she blatantly stated from the floor across the coffee table our card game was progressing on. "The same 26 letters are chosen and formed together to make words that inspire empires, build cities, start religions, mend broken souls, crush hearts, and form all that life is built upon," she continued, "so if you think spending a few extra heartbeats on deciding which combinations of those powerful 26 shapes to speak then, my love, we just can't seem to be together anymore," she mockingly frowned. I can't believe there was a time where we openly joked about being apart, as if it was some foreign concept that could never impede the safe walls we hid behind like the covers in the morning before we started our days.
"Darling, you were just ordering pizza over the phone, not delivering an inaugural address, I don't think there are any other letter combinations to say large cheese pizza please, pizza please, pizza please," I couldn't get the last two words to feel right but she acted as if my repetition wasn't as weird as a second head. She just burst into a gorgeous fit of laughter before slamming her cards on the table and forging another mindless conversation that had me hanging onto every word slipping out of her mouth.
"Does he kiss you more than once? Does he care if it's perfect?" Sweet disposition, mild mannered Harry, was bubbling with a devestated anger. "How many times does her whisper how much he loves you into your ear when he moves in the middle of the night? When you make love with him," I almost vomit at the thought of her touching anyone other than my damaged body, "does he stop just to appreciate how your hair sticks to your forehead in the little crinkles you get above your eyebrows? Does he know who Johnny was? Does he know about why you refuse to leave bed every December 5th?" I was whispering now, unsure if even she could hear me, and forcing my eyes to stay dammed and not let waterfalls of tears to pour. "Does he know that everything in the world in unbalanced, uneven, misplaced, and imperfect except for you?"
As if she didn't hear me spill the last remaining bits of my heart out of my mouth, she only said one thing, "you didn't repeat any of those words."
"I'm working on getting better. For you." I muttered the last two words. I had never been ashamed around her, but her indignation of my heartfelt words caused me to feel self aware and nervous all of a sudden.
"You don't need to, get better, you know. You're incredible the way you are. Someone will love every inch of your being," she said as if she was blind to her own presence in my life.
"Someone did love my being and held every ounce of my soul in her hands, only to throw it away because I was taking up too much of her time," I spit back. I never wanted to hurt her, ever, but in this moment my words felt like venom and I wanted to see it creep into her bloodstream. "Someone did tell me I was everything to them, but on some random Tuesday walked out of our house filled with love, leaving only a destroy heartbroken mess in her wake."
"It wasn't just some random Tuesday, Harry, that wasn't just some sporadic decision I made. I had been feeling that way for months, I had been thinking I need to move on for a while," she couldn't look me in the eyes anymore and for the first time in my life I was grateful for that. I don't think I could bear to see the eyes I adored look so distant at me as if I was a wandering stranger in her life.
"So you had felt like I was holding you back and ruining your life for months, but you felt the need to stick around for poor little Harry who couldn't even go to sleep without flicking his light switch on and off 13 times," I was breaking my own heart at this point.
"You weren't ruining my life. I will never regret a moment I had with you. You were my everything and if I'm being completely honest, there are moments when you still are," my heart stopped and I felt it picking up from the floor for a slight moment, mending at the simple thought of her still adoring me. I was pathetic. "But that doesn't mean I didn't need to move on with my life."
"I'm been getting better. For you." All I could do was repeat my words from earlier as I turned around and walked away from her, the first time doing so.
That night when I got home, I left the door unlocked. The lights on.
I still wanted to find her in our bed.
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Definitely not my best. I had a lot of different directions I wanted this part to go. But I've extended the story to possibly go on to 10 parts rather than the intended 5.
Please let me know what you think in the comments or help spread the story by voting (and it lets me know people actually like the story).
xx
