Breaking up and breaking down

Never has the written word failed me like now. Never has the only way I know of communicating purely and honestly left me short-handed, like now. I have sat down every evening on my porch, with a cup of hot tea with milk and a spoon of honey, overlooking the busy street and the kids enjoying the liberty that summer nights bring with them. Laughing and playing. My notepad resting in my lap along with the pen he gifted me on our first date. He wanted to have the honour of contributing to my writing that he admired so much, he said. Had I seen a small glimpse of the future and the heartbreak I would endure, I would never have let that Parker pen weigh in my hand. I would have just stood up and left the room to go see my luck somewhere else. Bought my own expensive pen. But life wouldn't be life without what's unknown, now would it?

Soon I would change the cup of tea for a glass of wine and as the hollowness of the bottle on the table in front of me expanded, I would look down on the sheets of paper in my lap and they would stare back at me empty or maybe with a little word scribbled down and then crossed over several times. And yet I did not give up. Evening after evening, night after night I tried. In my mind I thought writing about his betrayal would heal me. If I could just structure all that has happened and look at it with critical and analyzing eyes I would understand and if I understand how I could have been such a fool to let down my gardue and believe this man wouldn't hurt me like everyone else had ever done before him, I would be able to move on without the painful ache in my chest. However, as the days went by more emptiness was all that was created. Empty bottles, empty sheets, empty life. 

No feeling leaves you as short of breath as the feeling of betrayal by the one person who knows all your vulnerabilities. By the one human being that you have let have a close up on your soul. It's very hard to describe, this feeling of nakedness and emptiness. As if someone took out all what's inside of you and left the shell and you become so light gravity won't stand a chance to keep you rooted to Mother Earth and you feel like you have lost your connection and force. You stop belonging. You stop being. You barely exist. 

At first you pull yourself together thinking you let him go and you will be fine without him, little knowing that he took every breath with him. You flex your muscles and plaster a smile on your face and ensure everyone that you are just FINE... F I N E. Which confuses everyone around you. How do you comfort the brokenhearted when they haven't allowed themselves be brokenhearted yet? It's much less confusing if you break down and implode in front of everyone, if you flaunt your skinned soul and let all the devastation flow right out of you. People know what to do in case of sorrow. People know what to say to the betrayed when they appear betrayed. What happens though, when the betrayed is still standing tall? How do you comfort someone that obviously has no sorrow, even though they definitely should? Nobody knows. Hence, people pull back. People withdraw from the battlefield because they can't find the supposed casualties. And you? You are left more and more alone. Until one day...

Until that dreadful morning. When you turn in your bed, facing his side and open your eyes... And you see nobody. When it finally sinks in that he actually left. That he is gone. That he took all those years you have invested in loving him along with some of his personal belongings and left you his side of the bed... Empty. Then and there you realize that you are not so fine... That you actually are pretty messed up and have an empty side of your king size bed, that you picked out together. Then the memory from picking that bed out jumps to your mind and with it dragging along other memories - and you realize that he took all of that... And he left. He left you in a huge empty bed, in a bedroom where half the drawers are empty and half the closet has coat-hangers with nothing on but an old tie here and that shirt you bought him two months ago there. With framed pictures on your shelves capturing you in precious moments in life, never to return, turned upside down for you not to hurt whenever entering the room. That is the moment you implode and then explode and you cry and cry and barely leave the bed nor answer any calls. That is the day your sister has to come knock on your door to make sure you are alive and you have to drag yourself up and open the goddamned door for her not to call the police and you wrap yourself in your robe he gave you and you try to erase that pitiful look of I-have-surrendered-to-life's-messed-up-game and weeping by robbing your face with the palms of your hands and you look at yourself in the mirror to see that you actually look even worse now and you hear the doorbell ring again impatiently and you have to open and you do and one look at your sister and you loose your breath and you start weeping again and sink to the floor and your sister sinks down to try to catch you and she puts her arms around you and you feel like you are ten and your knee hurts after you fell and scraped it and you wonder where Mommy is and you remember she also left you and the weeping grows heavier and louder... And there, in your hallway with the photos on the walls of happy tanned faces looking passionately at each other with some tourist attraction in the background... There and then, you break. In the arms of your sister. 

Then your sister's arms grow numb from holding you and she starts looking apologetically on you because she left the kids alone at home but she needed to see you were still alive. And you pull yourself together again and tell her you are fine now. Again, you're fine. It was just a bad day. She looks at you with shame in her eyes asking you if you are sure and you insist you are and both of you know it's a lie. But she has to leave. And she does. Which leaves you to the dark monster in your head again. You shut the door after her and turn to lean on it, sliding down on it to sit on the floor, with your legs stretched out in front of you and your arms to the side and you try to take long, calming breaths but your tears still won't stop to fall down your cheek. Eventually, you give up and let them wander down your face. On the floor you sit and you continue crying and sobbing. Till you wake up the next morning, your entire body aching from sleeping on the floor. The pity you feel for yourself creates an urge to cry even more but you start crying without tears... Your tears have dried out.

That's when you understand you've hitten rock bottom. You can't fall further. Your life is now shattered into pieces. Small, tiny pieces that lie scattered around you in front of the eyes of everyone. The only choice you have left is to pick every piece up and mending the disaster into what could resemble anything like your old life. "Excuse me sir, that's a piece of my life you are stepping on there." and "Sorry ma'm, but I think you are seated on a piece of my life, can I have it back?" Everywhere, pieces of your memories, emotions, the betrayal in front of the eyes of friends and colleagues and sometimes total strangers. And as you mend and plaster and retie strings you start feeling it's a little bit easier to breathe, and even a little easier still a month later. One day you go to bed and realize you haven't thought about him not once, the entire day. 

 ***

"What could possibly catch this beautiful woman's attention?" I look around and see a man of average height and a kind face looking at me. I look around me to see if he is talking to someone else, but his beautiful dark eyes rest on my face and he is smiling the kindest, warmest smile. "Are you talking to me?" I ask confused. "Yes I am. I have tried all possible ways to catch your attention from smiling, to nodding, to approaching you to talk, to even making the barista over there (he nods towards the coffee place where I have just been to fetch my morning coffee) to write you a note from me on your mug." He pauses and then laughs the most melodic laughter I have heard in a while. "You really are that distracted, it's not pure inapproval of my mere existence that makes you ignore my every attempt!" he exclaims after noticing my confusion. "Armando." He presents himself stretching forth a paint-stained rough hand. A painter. "Faith..." I answer and shakes his hand after some hesitation. "My pleasure, miss Faith." Spanish accent? "Well? How do you wish for the future love of your life to approach you?" I laugh. For the first time in a long while. I think for a moment. "I do prefer the future love of my life to approach me as I am sitting alone at a table in my favourite coffee shop in town reading a book and asking me if he can sit on the empty chair beside me." "Well then, beautiful lady. Do you mind if I sit here?" He points at the chair and without waiting for my response fires of a big smile and sits himself comfortable. That results in my second heartfelt laughter in a long while. "Armando..." I trie his exciting name in my mind.