Once Upon A Time

First Draft

If I could make life a storybook…I'd edit it hundreds, maybe even thousands of times before I sent it to the publisher. Parts would be rewritten, forgotten, added, and subtracted just to create this euphoric fairytale. I’d write it with one flawless beginning and one happy ending; just like all fairytales are written. Once upon a time, a girl knew how to love. Once upon a time, she didn’t give her heart to boys who didn’t know what to do with it. Once upon a time, she knew how to say “I love you” when she knew what love was. No, she wasn’t scared; those powerful words made her believe she could fly. The words took her on an amazing journey with her perfect prince. The two loved each other so innocently, yet so intensely. There was no heartbreaking, and no need for heart healing. Both hearts could stay perfectly whole, and they had everything they needed for happily ever after. 

If only that was life. As much as we’d like to believe that’s how it happens, it’s not and too often, the real story goes a little something like this. Once upon a time, a girl was reckless and naive. Once upon a time, she was hungry for love. Once upon a time, she had fallen in love a first time, and a second time, and a third and a fourth, and however many times it took for her to realize there were too many frogs in the pond, yet not enough fish in the sea. Once upon a time, she fell in love with her best friend. Even if their story was written with a mix of smiling and sadness, laughing and fighting, confusion and satisfaction...she knew that finally, this was love. But she was scared; even if she knew she couldn’t fly, she thought she’d crash again. She left her words unsaid and journey untraveled because her heart swerved enough for this boy, this prince charming. But even if he was perfection, timing never was. They lost each other, as well as their hearts. Not the ending one would expect, but it’s the ending nobody wants.

And sadly for us, life isn’t a storybook nor a fairytale. Life to us is a reality. We can make believe and rewrite the stories in our heads, but we can’t rewrite the aching in our hearts. We can erase words on a page, but we can’t erase how their voice used to say them. We can delete the texts we sent at midnight, but we can’t delete the memories we spent with them. As much as we try to move on, we can’t because it’s easier to remember happiness than to try and forget it. And though that’s not how the stories are told, well that’s how they happen. For once upon a time, there is no happily ever after.