Breakfast together and a long ride after, during which lots of talking occurred, most of it trivial and nervous, you thought. You injected, when possible, your feelings and provided several opportunities for an in-kind response, but it was not forthcoming.
Earlier you held her in her kitchen, she jumped up and wrapped her legs around you. You stayed that way with her for at least a minute. Didn't that signify something? You were looking for more hopeful signs like that, but they did not arrive.
Trying to explain herself, at your urging, she said something that cut you. When you reacted, she acted as if she'd misspoken, but it was the third time in the last couple of years she said something like that. This gnaws at you for the rest of the day. And though it's good to see her after such a long absence, you feel ill. It gets worse after you've dropped her off. Everything seems ambiguous, a cover. You shift from suspecting to knowing she is spending her time with someone new, and she never once said she wasn't. I do love you, she said, but...
Night falls. You are obsessing about this car you saw parked outside her house a couple of days ago. You have been thinking this thought for hours now. You know it's wrong to go there to check, but the thoughts are becoming more vivid, more demanding. You know it's not smart to feed this.
You will go there. You have a message prepared for when you see the car. You will tell her you are letting go. You will use the word goodbye - a word you've never said to her before.
When you get there, the car you expected to see is not there. You are not sure if you're relieved or disappointed. But her car isn't there either, and this brings on another round of speculation, of telling yourself stories. It's late. There are other possible explanations, but you know what you think you know. It fits well into the backdrop of the day and of the last silent month - her distance, politeness, ambivalence, minimal physical expression of affection.
You text her a short message canceling a plan you had together, not using the words you had planned. You wonder if she will respond - and it looks like she is typing immediately, but then it stops. No reply comes. When you get home, you delete her from your contacts again.
I am letting go now.
Driving with her this morning, you noticed the grass greening west of here. The forsythia is beginning to bloom. After the forsythia comes warmer temperatures and the sweet smell of lilacs. They used to mean something to her. This would have been the third lilac season you saw together, had you made it.
Earlier you held her in her kitchen, she jumped up and wrapped her legs around you. You stayed that way with her for at least a minute. Didn't that signify something? You were looking for more hopeful signs like that, but they did not arrive.
Trying to explain herself, at your urging, she said something that cut you. When you reacted, she acted as if she'd misspoken, but it was the third time in the last couple of years she said something like that. This gnaws at you for the rest of the day. And though it's good to see her after such a long absence, you feel ill. It gets worse after you've dropped her off. Everything seems ambiguous, a cover. You shift from suspecting to knowing she is spending her time with someone new, and she never once said she wasn't. I do love you, she said, but...
Night falls. You are obsessing about this car you saw parked outside her house a couple of days ago. You have been thinking this thought for hours now. You know it's wrong to go there to check, but the thoughts are becoming more vivid, more demanding. You know it's not smart to feed this.
You will go there. You have a message prepared for when you see the car. You will tell her you are letting go. You will use the word goodbye - a word you've never said to her before.
When you get there, the car you expected to see is not there. You are not sure if you're relieved or disappointed. But her car isn't there either, and this brings on another round of speculation, of telling yourself stories. It's late. There are other possible explanations, but you know what you think you know. It fits well into the backdrop of the day and of the last silent month - her distance, politeness, ambivalence, minimal physical expression of affection.
You text her a short message canceling a plan you had together, not using the words you had planned. You wonder if she will respond - and it looks like she is typing immediately, but then it stops. No reply comes. When you get home, you delete her from your contacts again.
I am letting go now.
Driving with her this morning, you noticed the grass greening west of here. The forsythia is beginning to bloom. After the forsythia comes warmer temperatures and the sweet smell of lilacs. They used to mean something to her. This would have been the third lilac season you saw together, had you made it.
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