I haven't seen him since that day at the grocery store. Well, 'haven't seen' is a bit misleading, isn't it? It makes it sound like it was because of some outward force beyond my control. In reality it was simply my conscious decision to stop seeing him. I guess it just lost its purpose. I once left the world at his doorstep, shed every layer of skin and gave myself entirely, unreservedly to him. With him I was self-centered, insecure, obnoxious, unappealing; I was myself without restraints. I was not what my parents wanted of me, what society said I should be. I was simply myself and the sum of my terrible qualities.
It lost its purpose because after seeing him there; pushing his trolley and checking items off his grocery list, the lights suddenly switched on, and I could so plainly see what I was once completely oblivious of. This man; this beautiful, kind, creature that took me in and let me explore the whole of him, venturing so deep that I somehow found myself along the way. And with all of that, I couldn't possibly just drop in, have him, and leave.
I've said that I stopped visiting him, but I can't say it was easy. It came and went in waves; the desire to see him. Once I even got to his building, before turning away. I don't think of him often, but there are times when my desire—my need—to see him manifested itself so strongly within me that I began to wonder if I'll ever manage to get over it. I say get over it, and you immediately assume that it was love. But it wasn't love, not even in the slightest, and if you thought it was, then you should go back and read every sentence, every word I've written. What I felt for him was not simply—not only—love. It was an intense appreciation of the very air that he breathed, and conversely, the clear understanding of how little he truly meant to me.
And there are times when I couldn't even remember his face. I do remember his eyes being big and protruding and the colour of murky river water. I remember his smile; kind and unassuming, and secretly mocking me (or so it seemed to be). I remember the hair on his arms, and how it grew more sparse as you traveled up his limbs. I remembered all of his parts with all its little details, but never him as a whole. I guess that's just how it is with memories; they slowly slip away until the only thing remaining is the rabble.
He never came to see me, just in case you were wondering. Though I've spent countless days waiting for him. He had to, right? I imagined, I dreamed, of the day he came knocking on my door. It'd be late at night, sometime during the winter. My address would be written down on a paper, sitting right at the centre of his desk. He never did muster the courage to do it before, but tonight was unlike any other night. Tonight, he decided to just sod it all and come see me.
So he found himself at my apartment building. Studying it, skimming over the windows; wondering which one belonged to me. Wondering if I'm awake; with my terrible sleeping pattern, I should be. Wondering if I ever got over my troubles with sleep. I probably did, by now. It's been years, after all.
And years, and years, and years.
Even in my own dillusions, he turns away. It always ends this way, no matter how hard I tried to change it. The furthest it got was with him knocking on my door and disappearing down the corridor. I didn't even get to see the back of his head. Fucking pathetic, isn't it? Dreams are meant to be our escape from reality, where we seek out our wildest and most far-fetched of desires.
But I guess some things are just not meant to happen, huh?
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