It has been said, ‘time heals all wounds.’ I do not agree. The wounds remain. In time, the mind, protecting its sanity, covers them with scar tissue and the pain lessens. But, it is never gone.
-Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy
Someone once told me a similar thing. Time doesn’t heal the wounds. Time only helps us forget. I guess he was right. ’cause he forgot.
There are times when the ghost of that one decision I made, haunts me. A lot of questions start flooding my mind. The most constant of which, “Was he only testing me?” At that moment, I knew I didn’t want to leave. I won’t be able to stand living each day not seeing and talking to him. My life does not depend on him. He’s just someone I could really talk to and spend so much time with having fun. We could talk about anything under the sun — from movies, to food, to life. Just about everything. And people who know me well know that I am not very fond of losing people in my life. I always have a hard time dealing with people who leave.
“I didn’t want to leave. I can’t,” that’s what I thought, when I finally saw him walking down the CTC hallway in this red shirt, with his black Samsonite backpack hanging over one shoulder. “I don’t want to.” But something inside me told me I had to leave. I had to let him go so he can pursue other things he can’t, with me by his side.
Now that decision haunts me. Was it right to let him go? Was he really looking forward to someone else? Someone new? Something else? Or was I just being so paranoid, feeling so much self-pity, that I actually made myself believe he wanted me gone? What if he just wanted to know if I still wanted to stay? That I won’t ever leave his side no matter what, just like I said? What if he was expecting me to say “No, I don’t want to spend less time with you”? What really happened there? Did I hurt him thinking I was doing what he wanted me to?
So many questions left unanswered. So many what-ifs. And all I can do is wonder if one day, I’ll be able to find the answers to them. He’s found someone else. A new me. It still hurts like hell knowing he found someone to replace me. It’ll hurt even more knowing he found her because I left him, when all he wanted was security, assurance, confirmation, that I still wanted to be with him. That being with him wasn’t such a hassle for me but a pleasure. If he only knew that spending time with him was what I was always looking forward to every time I go to school. Nevermind the hassle of going to school five hours earlier or leaving school seven hours later, or the waiting. What mattered was that I was going to spend time, I spent time, with him. If he only knew how much I looked forward to our everyday meetings. Now, he will never know. That girl will make everything feel alright, untouched, undisturbed, unchanged. He will feel as he felt when it was me with him. She will make him feel and think that nothing changed. That he was still there, and this girl was still there, still spending time together. It will be, to him, unchanged. It will be as if that short period of being alone was nothing more but a nightmare. And now, this girl has returned and everything’s back to normal. Nothing has changed.
***
Leaving someone when you love someone
Is the hardest thing to do
When you love someone as much as I love you
I don’t wanna leave you, it tears me up inside
But I’ll never be the one you’re needing.
-I Love You, Goodbye, Celine Dion
when pigs & penguins fly.. 