What It’s Like To Fall In And Out Of Love

What can be done to save a flame without the tiniest of sparks to rekindle it? When the butterflies in your stomach have begun to rot and there is no longer a correlation between the rate of your heartbeat and his skin’s proximity to your own.

He has seen you in your entirety, and you have seen every part of his soul. There is no more mystery, no more to learn, nothing more to seduce out of each other. You can vaguely remember the night when he fell apart in your arms and allowed every piece of himself to fall at your feet. The intimacy and honor that overwhelmed you in his moment of vulnerability have long been gone and you have become unable to find joy in the soul that he surrendered to you – like a Christmas present you loved as a child but shortly lost in the back of a closet. You gave yourself to him, as well. Slowly but surely allowed his friendly smile and trustworthy eyes to coax small parts of yourself out into the light where they revealed themselves to him, until he had seen every dark corner of your mind and was able to understand your thoughts more clearly than you.

But what was left when there was no more to surrender? When you had no more fears or flaws to admit to his charm and he had no more ghosts to breathe into your comforting arms in the darkest hours of the night. There was only you and him, with every inch of yourselves displayed under blinding fluorescent lights for the other to see. You were able to look at his brooding face and see every moment and every scar written into the subtle wrinkles on his forehead. He could see every insecurity and fear written across your body. And slowly your compassion for him was replaced with numbness and his adoration for you gave way to detachment.

I have no answers to these questions. I am existing with the understanding that there is another human out there in the world who possesses a thorough knowledge of my soul but does not desire it. And I am existing with the burden of knowing intimately the soul of another who I no longer love. So I wake up each day and take life one moment at a time. I fight to pierce through the fog of longing caused by the emptiness left behind by a lost love, hoping that one day I will see the sun. And everything will be bright.