I Want You to Know

5 - Goodbye on My Terms

We should have done have things differently.

You should have left that first time you decided you didn't want to talk to me. When you just didn't feel that urge to keep your word, you should've picked up the phone and let it be over.

I should've left the second and the third time after that. I should have left like I threatened to do. I told you it wasn't okay. It wasn't okay to just decide that I wasn't worth responding to. But you did it anyway.

You should've have left the moment you broke a promise for the first time. Three months in and you broke the biggest promise of all. All along you had just been saying the right words, and you knew the words you strung together were the only words that I wanted to hear.

I should've left the first time I wondered is this going to work? The answer was always no. I should have left once I started worrying about what we were going to talk about, when I started to make a list of conversations to have with you, when I realized that I spent more time talking about you than to you.

You should have left when you first realized that you wanted to.

But so should've I.

I should've said goodbye the moment the words break up with him crossed my mind.

I should've known on one of those nights I was left crying on my bedroom floor at 1am, 2am, until 3am. Crying in the light of the night, sitting defeated in front of the mirror, my face swollen, splotchy, and unrecognizable. Because of you.

I should've left when I had to fight to keep you from rejecting me. You shut me down time after time, like I was nothing. That night should have been the last straw.

When that thought crossed my mind, I should've done it. I should've stood up for myself then.

I shouldn't have turned my phone off that night. I should've left so I wouldn't have the urge to run every time I meet someone like you. I should've left that night ecause we would have ripped the Band-Aid off and faced the truth of what was. The truth that we were never meant – it would've been mine so much earlier if I had decided to fight for myself instead of to fight for us by fighting with you.

And that's when I should have left.

I should've spoken up that night.

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Author's Note: This is my personal story, inspired by things that I went through. While I want to tell my story, I also hope that my readers can relate to my words. I hope that this story pulls at your heartstrings. Because, well, sometimes there is comfort in words that can break your heart. 

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