#complex simplicity

Even more, he had to trust that when they did crush his heart — when they clutched it tightly in their traitorous palm, when they squeezed it until it burst, when the unrelenting pressure of their grip became too much to bear — he had to trust that they wouldn’t crush it beyond repair; he had to pray that his heart wouldn’t shatter into hundreds of thousands of pieces, too small for him to repair. And yet, his trust was useless, because as much as he yearned for them to care for him gently, it was ultimately him who was handing them his heart; he was the one encouraging them to squeeze, tighter and tighter and tighter, until it burst into hundreds of thousands of pieces he wouldn’t be able to repair. But Adrian was foolish, and so he repeated the tortuous cycle, over and over and over again.