I'll Grow Older and Prettier
I have lived many lives since you.
And I will live many more without you.
With each life, a piece of you is lost.
The way you said my name and the honey that drenched the vowels falling out of your mouth.
Or the torpedoes of emotion I felt through the intensity of your eyes, throwing away the memory of you across a crowded room. aiming those torpedoes straight at me.
Or those anxious days I spent apologizing, to the day you walked away after my outburst.
I want to walk through your memories like I scorch the earth your very foundation lies upon.
I want you to feel that intense loss I can never seem to shake, my arm stuck in the sleeve for far longer than I’d want to admit.
I want to scare you with how much you long to see me again. to breathe the same air and walk beside me.
I want you to long so deeply you forget to decompress on the way up.
But I’m not that way. I want justice but there is no justice to be had. The only thing you did wrong was give me attention, and slowly the high that used to bring feels more like the claustrophobia of driving my car into a lake. I cannot unbuckle while my car slowly fills to the brim with water.
I don’t have to ask if you felt it too anymore. I know what was there in those torpedo eyes and honey vowels and I can only eat the hurt it brings up until I’m full on leftovers.
So I’ll go on and live more lives like the ones I lived since you. I'll grow older and prettier and you’ll wish you never did turn your back that last time. But what good does wishing for a rewrite on a submitted story? Your publisher took control and you’re not going to be able to fix that ending now unless you find the right door for the key you inevitably hold.
So, if or until you get the door found, I’ll keep living new lives.
