Dear John

*May 12, 2011
Dear John,

I’m tired of pretending like this doesn’t hurt. Like the way your voice holds no warmth, no comfort doesn’t affect me. I’m tired of pretending to feel no pain.

I get tired of this game; I get tired of the lies. No matter how I try and twist it to be ok, it never feels the same. Every night that you come home an hour later and just a little bit more drunk and angry with a new set of rules to throw in my face, is a night that I slowly realize I can’t take this any longer.

I’m sitting in the dark of our messy closet, my knees drawn to my chest your sweater pressed to my face, my eyes squeezed shut against the tears I can’t seem to find the strength to fight. It’s over, isn’t it?

I could continue to draw this out as long as I want, and all that would accomplish me is more of this.

I try to keep the agony that is ripping through my body quiet and muffled, but I don’t think anyone could hear it anyway, no one ever does. You lie. You lie to me, and I accept it. Sometimes I even convince myself that I believe. I don’t know why I choose to be let down, why I choose to be hurt.

I could say that I love you, and let that explain it all away, but I don’t think that will work, not this time, not today. Today I’ve accepted things that I can’t bring myself to believe, today I understand.

It feels like you’ve died. What hurts the most about that is the fact that you’re still alive; you’re only dead to me. And I’m the one that loves you; I’m the one that will be there when everyone else has left. When these people you call your friends have taken all your money and used all your drugs and you are alone. I am the one who will still care.

I’m so tired of this game.

If I could sleep I would, if I could make this go away and wake to what I had before, I would. But I can’t sleep. I won’t sleep until you are safely in bed with me, snoring your alcohol away smelling of the bar and other people. Then I will sleep. And in the morning, I will leave.





*June 7, 2011
Dear John

You will never know what it was like to wake up in the morning, and wonder who I was waking up with. Would he be the man I loved today? Or would he be distant and cold, unfeeling and cruel.

To live a life that is in a constant state of turmoil and change is to live no life at all, and somewhere along the way, I gave up who I was to love who you had become. I let it swallow me whole, and for that I will hate you and myself for the rest of my life.

You will never know what it was like to be afraid of who I loved. To feel a flighty nervous wave of fear hit my body every time you raised your voice, every time I saw the spark of anger in the eyes I used to think were beautiful. That fear grew into something dark as the time went by and the fights got worse. It became a strain of hatred that would at a moment’s notice turn back to love, if only you would love me too.

I used to live for you. I’d breathe for you.

You were in almost every waking thought, and you were center stage every dream.

Now I refuse to know you exist.

And you will never know how much that hurts.

What do I say, what is left to be heard after all the tears I have cried, and all the things I have begged of you. What love is left to live when you gave it up to die?

I heard today you talk about me. Is it wrong I’m happy you still know I’m alive? Is it wrong I’m happy that maybe you feel the loss of me?

Do you?

Do you feel loss when you think back on me in your life?

I can’t believe I’m the only one that hurts. I can’t remember you and the way it felt to be with you, to hear your voice in my ear at night, to feel your arms around me as we lay in bed silent with sleep, and not think that you have to miss me.

I’m too scared to find out the truth is I’m wrong to ever ask.
So I sit and I live. And I pretend that I never loved you.
I pretend that I never lost you.

I pretend.

*July 21, 2011
Dear John

I hate to think that you will love someone the way you should have loved me.
Is that wrong?

I hate to think that you will lie awake next to her in the bed that was once ours, and be content. I hate her, for not having to feel what I did near the end, almost every day the last days of us.

I hate her, because I know you. And I know you will not have picked someone who will care, who will see what is wrong for you, and try to keep you from it. I hate her for not being me.

I hate you for killing what should have lasted so much longer, and so much better than you ever gave it a chance to. I hate that you didn’t care how much I cared.

I want to forget the times we had that made me want to be with you. I want to sit here and cry because I stayed, not because I left. I get through the days by telling myself that you couldn’t have loved me, not with the things you did to me, the way you lied. You couldn’t have.

Yet I know you did. In your own twisted way. And that’s what I hate most. I could have followed you anywhere, and all you did was drag me down.
It hurts me more than you will ever know; to be sitting here waiting for the storm that I can’t help but know is coming. I know what you will tell people, and it will soil whatever good there was about us. But that’s you.

I tried to so hard, for so many days to keep you golden, but the things you did and the lies you really seemed to believe came down like rain and kept tarnishing until all that was left was a dirty green copper. And even still, I find that I’m clutching to you with all the fear and pain of a drowning person. I hurt in ways I never imagined you would make me feel.

When I met you, I thought I had found someone who would understand what it was to be hurt, someone who would have learned from the pain and do right. And I held to that belief far longer than I ever should have.
Because I still believe it today.

I am a stupid person by nature. I live by faith. And I never lost mine in you. Even when I was left crying in the snow, with you hating me on the other side of the door; even when I was home alone once again at four in the morning, six hours after you were supposed to be home, feeling sick to my stomach because I knew what you were doing. Even when I was crying on the floor with a bruised face and an even more damaged ego listening to you tell me how you hated me, even after every time I hurt from your hands. I knew you loved me. And I held to that.

Now I have to hate her.

Because when I finally got the courage to leave you and that hopeless faith behind, you replaced me.
With her.

I hate to think that you will love someone the way you should have loved me. Is that wrong?

I don’t know if you will ever feel what I feel when you think about me. Do you have flash backs every day? Do you see yourself with me, and the places we went, the music we listened to, the days we stayed in bed and held each other from night to dawn, to night again?
Or do you lie down with her, and forget me completely?

I loved you.

I still love you. And that will never be good enough for either of us. And I hate you, and I hate her, and I hate me for all of it.