Para's Ponderings

Moving is always an enlightening time. Packing your entire life into boxes and being unsure how to put everything back the way it was before.

I was asked to move something into my old bedroom. I walked in and Immediately felt sick. Distance really separates you from your worst memories.

The room was empty, and the carpet was now gone, but I swear I still saw my old bed for a split second. I still saw myself under my bed using the carpet to block out the sound of my tears, knowing that he had already left, but still afraid he would walk through that door.

Two years on my own, but walking through that door is enough to undo all my healing. I guess maybe I never got over it, but I was doing a great job of pretending that I did – and that was enough.

I see it all.

I see me running away after an argument, catching the train to see him, and watching all of my hope and excitement turn into something dark.

I see me thinking that being with him in a public space would make me any safer, hiding behind the playground hoping that no one would see me like that.

I see me lying on his driveway crying, unable to move. I see my trip in the ambulance when I could tell that they thought I was just being dramatic.

I see me remaining hopeful, thinking that he would stop once I told him. He didn’t.

I see myself crying on my bedroom floor, bleeding so much that I thought I might die.

I see all my positives turn into negatives in the blink of an eye.

I see him explain to me how it’s all my fault, and if I really cared, I wouldn’t have let him hurt me.

I see him talking to other girls on the internet, ones his own age. I see him refer to me as “some girl that’s obsessed with me” and he tells them that he’s single.

I see myself trying to break up with him, and him threatening to kill himself.

I see him telling me that I’m not good enough for him, and giving me a list of things that I need to change to be good enough.

I see myself writing my very first suicide note, because he abandoned me, after telling me that the only thing I was good for was being the person that he hurt. Who am I if the person that gave me a purpose is gone?

I see him telling his friends that I made it all up. What proof could I have when I was too afraid to speak?

I see him replacing me for another girl, even younger than me. I see him paying for her flights, and abandoning her in an unfamiliar state. I see her reaching out to me, and me trying and failing to help her, as he hurt her worse than he hurt me.

I just can’t stop seeing it all. It’s all I’ve seen since I moved back in.

I lived in my apartment for two years. My biggest pain was loneliness, and occasionally the delusional hope that I’d find someone that wouldn’t hurt me.

Confronted with all of these fears again, it’s getting harder to breathe. I feel like I’m still that same scared 14 year old, wondering if there was anything more to life than being the punching bag.

I found the answer. There is nothing more to life. That’s not the role I fulfill anymore, but I never found another. Spending two years away taught me that. I will never be more than who I was 10 years ago. I’m still that same scared little child, horrified that no one will ever want me, so I end up around the most awful people. Most of my recent blows are emotional – but I’ve found that hurts more, and those scars last longer.

I don’t just flinch when someone raises their arm, I also panic when someone speaks, or looks at me. Wondering who will be the next person in my rotating cast of awful life choices.

Maybe someday I’ll have my own house, and I’d live there with someone who would never hurt me, and we’d have a happy life. I’d return to this house and that pain would be a distant memory.

But much like a happy life, he is purely hypothetical – He won’t ever come to be.

The prophecy was written many years ago, signed with my tears and written in my blood. Who I was then was who I’ll always be. So I’ll sit in my new room, I’ll close my eyes and I’ll slip back into delusion, and pretend that he exists.

I’ll spend more time in my mind, losing track of time hoping today will be the day I don’t wake up, and I can stay there for eternity.