My last break up was rough. It stung, it kept me up at night, it made me cry and hate the world. It was all my fault, but that sure doesn't make it easier to cope with.
It was rough.
Rough enough that when it ended, I didn't bother to put myself back together, to go out and find love again, to keep on going.
Instead, I shoved my dirty, beaten and bruised heart into a little tin chest and put it on the highest, most forgettable shelf, and kept it that way for years.
Everything else in life worked out alright, I moved out of home, rented a house, took a course, got a job, bought a car. I lived the life. Didn't I?
It's amazing how easy life actually is to coast through without emotions tying you down, everything works really smoothly because all of your focus goes into breathing and doing your daily tasks well.
But you still stand in the shower sometimes wondering why it feels cold, or you lie in bed wondering why it feels empty, or you completely break down into emotional paralysis and it's been so long that you forget why.
Some people aren't meant to be alone, others relish in it. I'm the first kind and after three years it begins really fucking with your head.
Which is why, when I laid eyes on her and knew that I wanted her in my life and would put myself out there to make it so, I was in trouble. There was no way to go about this half arsed.
Then there's her side of the story, the girl still so hurt by her lost love and still so confused about her life journey who was in the middle of deciding that she needed alone time and to get her life in order and live without dependence on another being.
The girl who I then met, kissed, fell asleep with and who made me afraid to ever lose this feeling again.
When we're together, the world is beautiful and alright. But when we're apart, I miss her so much and she misses herself.
I want to love her, to be with her and never let the world hurt her again and she wants herself.
I've become the Bull and she is little more than a China shop full of the most beautiful porcelain there is.
I'm trying not to break a single Goddamn thing, but every step I take rattles the shelves.
I don't want to be the Bull, I want to love her and I don't want a single crack in a single cup in this China shop.
And as far as I can tell, the only way to make this work is to head slowly for the door and not look at my reflection in the window as I walk away.