I've Retraced Every Step
By April, age 26, New Jersey
i thought i could have loved you. i thought i could hold you delicately in my hand,
without ever breaking, without ever hurting you. i've retraced every step, every moment
that has led me to this point. countless hours spent replaying every word in my head.
each detail as important as the next. deep down, locked away, i knew this day would eventually come.
i knew one day i would have to say goodbye. i just never thought it would be this soon.
i thought we had more time. time is a funny thing. a trickster with so much power, so much control.
a misleading sense of comfort. i always thought i had more time. always another tomorrow.
that was a lie that unraveled in my arms all too well. it eventually caught up to me.
"i've retraced every step, every moment..."
i thought i was better equipped to handle this. i had it under control. or so i liked to think.
if i was being completely honest, i would admit how it always had me consumed.
how i never knew what was going to happen one day to the next.
and i handled each moment as it came, just hoping i was strong enough to deal with the repercussions.
i never had a grip on it. never had a grip on us. all i knew was i didn't want it to end.
i didn't want to lose the moments we shared.
but time had a different plan for me.
a cruel, heart wrenching fate that i knew was going to come one day.
perhaps we were nothing more than a missed opportunity.
nothing more than two people who met at the wrong time, wrong place.
but i remember it differently. i remember you being the core to who i was,
to the person i longed to be, that i never really became.
i wanted to be a better person for you. now i know, i need to be a better person for myself.
i thought i could have loved you, but looking back i realize i never really could have. not truly.
you were too far off. you had dreams you needed to follow and time wasn't patient towards me.
i had hoped that when this day would come, that i would have been stronger, wiser.
i thought maybe i could approach this with logic, as if the heart knows of such nonsense.
but everything crumbled around me. and i was anything but.
"you always were the strong one." i thought about that. the word consumed me.
it's funny now that i think about it, i'm not even sure what the word strong even means anymore.
i do know that with each demon i face, i get pulled harder and harder towards the darkness,
falling faster than i can actual breathe. not knowing what is real from what i fake. becoming numb to the world around me.
to losing hope and faith and becoming unsteady.
faith was always my foundation and now its cracked. crumbling all around me by everything i thought i knew.
and despite this constant battle, the constant struggle, i try to find a way to awake each morning,
and to start new.
and sometimes, on the good days, there is a tiny glimpse of light at the end of this very dark and narrow road i'm on.
if that is considered strong, then maybe there is hope for me after all.
