It shouldn’t feel like a knife across the wrist every time I hear Arctic Monkeys or Local Natives or any of the songs we “made love” to. I shouldn’t feel triggered every time someone leans in to hug me and all I smell is you. I remember everything and it’s both a blessing and a curse.

Tonight’s the first night in a while that I’ve cried this hard. I’m not sure I’ll ever forget how my life felt, EXACTLY a year ago. Like everything I thought I knew was crashing down. How at that moment I regretted any and every selfish decision I made to not come to California. I remember crying in your arms, straight into midnight, when you wished me a simple “Happy Birthday.” Crying because everyone told me that my grandfather would die on my birthday. Die. Or at least so they thought.

“It was all I wanted for the longest time- to open my eyes and see you there. To stretch out my hand and touch the soft, yielding warmth of your skin. But now I have learned the secret of distance. Now I know being close to you was never about the proximity.”

Sometimes I still yearn for your presence and ache for your touch. The fire of love I had in me for you was a burning red and it’s starting to simmer down to a cold blue. I still don’t understand how you could hate me so much after everything we’ve been through and it pains me to know that for once, you’re within reach and I’m losing you all over again. I don’t know if this was worth all the heartache; I wish you ended it before it even began. The words you’ve told me, the lies you promised me, are planted in me. It’s like poison every time a “I still love him” slips out. How could I still think so highly of someone who thinks so lowly of me? I don’t think I’ll ever understand what goes through your mind and it saddens me to think about how I was very willing to spend the rest of my life figuring it out.