Promise Me This

I want honesty. Brutal, raw honesty. Ignorance is not bliss, not to me. I want to know if a girl hit on you at the bar and I want to know how you responded. I want to know if a girl is texting you, if she’s flirting with you and how you’re dealing with it. I want to know if when we were just seeing each other there was someone else, even if it meant nothing. Even if you were drunk. I want to know it all.

I want to know if you cheated and I want to know why. I want your loyalty to me to be more important than protecting me from the truth. I can deal with the truth, I can get over it. We can discuss it. But a lie? Withholding the truth? I cannot deal with that. I cannot forgive it.

You see, a lie is never just a lie. A lie is a promise of things yet to come. A lie is you choosing yourself over me. A lie is me always wondering where you are and who you’re with. A lie is me not believing you even if you are telling the truth. Because if you’ve lied once, why wouldn’t you do it again?

A lie is a constant unease, a constant question spinning inside my head. A lie is trying to understand the way your face looks when you’re being honest so I can know when you’re not. A lie is suspicion and broken sleep. A lie is a twisting inside my stomach. A lie is the end.

So promise me you’ll be honest, even if it hurts me, even if it breaks us. Promise me you’ll be honest even if it’s unnecessary, even if it means nothing. Promise me you’ll tell me it all so I can love you with everything I have. So my vulnerability doesn’t choke me.

Promise me your secrets will be my secrets. Promise me you’ll hold my heart in both hands and not let it slip. Not today. Not tomorrow. Not in the years to come.

And I promise you, I’ll trust you as recklessly as I love you. And maybe, just maybe, we will last forever.