Why?

I don’t know why I left you.

Sometimes I lie awake at night and I think about it. I mean, we were good together after all; we had fun, we connected, we laughed at the same jokes; and you know, we were good together in bed. We had all that going for us. And we were, we were happy, weren’t we? More often than not.

So, we had a good thing. And I should have been able to rejoice in it.

Right?

#

On nights like this I wake up and I can’t sleep. And I look across the pillow at the empty spot in this new bed. And you have to believe me, I feel so lonely. I just want to reach out and wrap myself around you. But I can’t. And it’s all my own doing. So instead I just want to throw my head into my hands and wail at myself, at my stupidity: what have I done? What have I done?

#

Daylight makes me brave. I wake up with all those clinging, desperate feelings. And I wake up in a strange room, surrounded by these strange walls with that strange pattern that puts me in mind of a room I slept in once as a child. Just roses and daffodils by daylight, but in the dark these patterns have a dragon-like quality that sucks me back to those days of being six years old and sleeping at Aunty May’s, but not being able to sleep because I was just too scared of all the monsters on the wall.

This wallpaper is like that wallpaper. And the monsters of self-doubt and fear go to work on me when I’m lying there, after midnight, with just a street-light shining through the window for company.

But then daylight comes; rose and daffodils. Harmless.

I try to remember: I came here to start a new life. I drove for four hours, with everything I own in the back of the car. I told myself that I was young, that I could do this. And I still think I can. And I still think, as much as I miss you, that we were holding each other back, and we could never live our fullest lives… Oh, who am I kidding? I say ‘we’, but I mean ‘me’, I mean that I wanted wings, I wanted colourful butterfly wings, and I wanted to spread them. I wasn’t thinking about you, and what was best for you, or what you wanted…

They call it FOBO now; distant third cousin of FOMO.

Fear of Better Offers.

Did I leave you for prospect of what might possibly, maybe, one day, who knows, be a thing?

I pour a coffee. I take a deep breath.

I came here to be brave, didn’t I?

#

A new job. Busy, busy. The magazine feels like a magazine should feel. It feels like a place where everyone is rushing around, so much to do, everybody energised, everyone excited by what they’re doing. And I remember the office I came from, before this; and how colourless it was, and how we were all just marking time, getting from nine to five any old way we could, just so we could go home and watch TV, eat takeaways, go to bed, do it all again.

Of course, I started thinking: is this all there is to life? What about all those dreams? That fifteen-year-old girl who wrote for the school paper, took a few pictures for it. Had all these daft dreams about front-page news and Pulitzers. Investigative articles. This what happens to us isn’t it, all of us, us humans, humanis modernius; we let ourselves morph from that girl into this too-young-to-be-old woman, into someone who finds herself too close to thirty and quietly suffocating in the emptiness.

Well, look at me now. Into the office at eight, a takeaway latte in hand. A bright shirt. A morning meeting. Assigned articles, research; things that actually make my heart beat. And at lunch I take photos, I experiment with angles; and back at my desk with colours and filters. I got out at night, or at the weekend – for long drives – stopping to catalogue my miles in photographs.

I used to come home each night and flop onto the couch, watch whatever was on TV – sometimes in your arms, and yes, that was nice, that was nice – grab something easy to eat. These days I’m reading things, or I’ll sit up and do some painting. Look, I have an easel set up, a canvas propped up on it, and there’s a painting in progress. This is how cool I am these days.

I have this theatre club I’ve joined. And there’s this bar where people from work meet. And-

But.

#

You know, sometimes I think it’s all a dream. I’m going to wake up, and the bed is going to be the one we had back home. You’ll be lying next to me. Snoring just slightly. The teddy-bears will be lined up along the windowsill, and your jacket’s hung over the door. From where I’m lying on the bed, I can see that rip in the carpet.

I can feel you reach for me.

I think: Thank God.

Sometimes.

#

There was something that happened outside my window two days ago. There was this kid cycling, and he got hit by a car. I mean, it wasn’t all that bad. He was probably okay. But there was blood, and I think he must’ve broken his leg, because he was crying and screaming and holding onto it. I called an ambulance – probably like half a dozen other people – but I didn’t go down there because there was already a solid little crowd gathering. The old guy – he looked about eighty – who hit this kid, he just looked so distraught, he was standing with his head in his hands, shaking his head back and forth like some distressed zoo animal. I felt awful for him. And there was this woman there, yelling at him, pointing her finger in his face. He was shying away from it. I felt like I was him, like I was down there on the road, pinned against my own car, and her finger was jabbing at my face, but I didn’t know what to say to her, just wanted to get past her and check on the kid…

…. You always used to say it, didn’t you? That I had too much imagination, that I let it get a hold of me, that my imagination’s in charge, and the rest of my just hangs on for the ride.

Well, truth: I almost called you up that evening. I reached for my phone, and I was selecting your number. I just needed to hear a voice that was kind, that I could just sink into and feel safe with. I was sick with missing you.

Almost dialled.

And then what?

Your last email: dripping pipes, soccer scores, your mum and her coupon collection, her ongoing argument with your childhood neighbour over whose paper is whose. There was just such a mundanity about it… I hear myself. Oh, I do hear myself. But I was so sure I wanted more out of life than…

… so sure that I do want more…

… But.

… My hand strays towards that phone. So often.

Look at me. I’m young and strong, the future’s all laid out in front of me.

And yet.

Still.

I pick the phone up. I put it down it again. That’s maybe the twelfth time today.

Picture credit/discredit: author's own work