To the man that taught me how to fall out of love

You caught me many times trying to escape, torn between out and in as you half watched; one eye on your world, the other on me. I said to you often that I feared it all. I feared the too little, the too much. I feared the fall, the process of giving in, then the giving up, the walking away after being pushed out.

But we loved when I was young and known only as being owned by the past so I sold myself to you for the promise of escape from two kinds of entrapment, as it had been years but I still saw your name as a question mark dotted with a heart when I wanted a full stop. I let you love me deep as you’d always wanted with others. I loved back. I settled into your white walls and braced with a push and a pull. We loved for a year despite my flights, oh god we loved.

I am sorry I could not withstand. We loved when I was young but I had to go and I’m sorry. ‘I’m sorry I was drunk’ when I couldn’t resist the first boy whose eyes didn’t scream ‘change me, heal me’, but I fell so deep below I couldn’t see past my apologies. I drowned in these waters so tainted by the guilt of my action that I couldn’t see you on the surface, and I know your hand was still reaching for me, it was always reaching, I just couldn’t see.

I tried and tried until I didn’t anymore. I kissed you and tasted ‘no’. I kept kissing in case I could wear away the taste of myself but ‘no’, ‘no’. I waited and begged myself to feel it, until I didn’t anymore. And I ran from arm to arm, prison to prison, until that felt okay.

I’m sorry I couldn’t stay the way I was and the way you wished I could be. I’m sorry that I healed and healed then ripped it all open just to cut deeper. I’m sorry that I had to leave. And I’m sorry you had to see me come back with eyes less glistening in your presence. I’m sorry for falling out of love. I’m sorry, in my history of being the window, not the brick; you were the man that taught me how to do that.