VI--
Many people would agree that I should have moved on by now. And I agree with them. Some days are easier than others -- either as easy as eating a slice of cake or deciding on a tattoo design. Other days, it's like when your worst fear makes you freeze up, and all the advice I've ever given out is just thrown out the window and I don't know what to do. How hypocritical, that I can't practice what I preach. What does that make me?
If anything, I'm trying to be anything but a coward. I don't want to remain stuck in one place -- I don't want to keep going through the same fear landscape over and over again, hoping for some improvement or an indicator of change. A coward is someone too afraid to take that next step, afraid of where it might lead them. So I try to be better.
They say people can be mended -- we mend each other -- but scars don't disappear completely. Tattoos may fade over time and the image grows distorted, but the ink remains, letting everyone know there is something still there.
I miss you. It would be dishonest of me to say that I don't, or that I no longer do. I admit that at times, I try not to miss you. Because it hurts. But it feels wrong of me to move on as if you meant nothing, that you were just a page in a book. The impact you left on my life is not something I can just discard. It was too short, and few, but maybe that's why it means so much more. I keep the memories of you in a box that I hide and bury deep in my heart so no one can find them and destroy them. Once in a while, I go through that box, but I can't stay long or else I start to drown. So I force myself to visit it less and less over the years. I think my record was almost a full year. If I had reached the full 365 days, my friends -- your friends -- said we would celebrate with cake. I still got a slice for effort.
I also have to be honest and say that it has gotten to a point where I am trying to look at other women. For the longest time, it felt wrong; I still felt like I was yours, as much as you were mine. I feel like I still am yours. My other problem is that I'm still looking for you -- in every small, blonde, brave woman who crosses my path, even for the briefest second. And I want to believe, each time, that you came back and found me. But I can't keep doing this to myself. I can't keep trying to find you. It would be unfair to you, and them, and myself.
I'm sorry. I know you want better for me, while I still just want you back. One day, I'll be brave enough to let go. I'm sorry for not being brave enough now. I'm still learning how to get better. I'm still learning how to keep moving forward -- learning that I don't need to go at a pace to keep up with a running train, that walking to where I need to be is good enough, as long as I don't stop and turn back.
I still love you. I'll still love you. And I miss you.
--IV
