quantumbutterfly

She thought she knew what she had signed up for. As he held her in his arms that last day, and she refused to cry, would not allow that indignity, he said it would be a month. Then suddenly it was three, like this disaster of a hell year isn’t bad enough.

She’s loved him for a very long time. And then he was briefly so close, but now so far away.He’ll never know about the times she falls on the floor crying. She knows her job: be supportive and kind; be a good little woman.

The rage always has to be contained. So much anger, so much pain and fear. Keep it quiet, like a nice girl. You have to shove it down.

She sleeps clutching the knife under her pillow but doesn't really believe that will make her safe.She hasn’t felt safe since she was eight years old.

He knows she’s suicidal sometimes, even though she’s been trying to hide it. She has “not on my watch” emblazoned in thick pen strokes on her wrist, atop her scars. There are other, slower ways to harm yourself.

When she accidentally gets sarcastic, she apologizes, because she’s supposed to be his sweet little baby. He thinks he knows what she actually is, but likes her dark side. He just thinks she’s a little edgy. He doesn't really know.

And she acts all sweet to him, hiding the pain and fear and anger because damn that’s a lot for someone to deal with and that’s her shit not his.

She smiles when he sends sexy gifs, because it means he still wants her. It means there is one person who cares.

She knows there is no one else like him, and that's why she cries. He’s the kind of man you’d burn the world for, and not even notice the flames licking up your own legs. She always said the last thing she would do was hurt him, and that’s the last thing she did.

I don't remember the first time I met Jason. We must have run into each other at small-town parties before the first clear memory I have of him: We were standing under the tree in his parents' front yard and he was talking about something that was probably 90% bullshit while I stared into his eyes, entranced. He has always had beautiful eyes.

It's not like I hadn't fallen in love before; at the ripe age of 18 I already had two long-term relationships under my belt. But he mesmerized me like nobody had before. I would have done anything for him. Then he left. He wasn't leaving me, in particular; he was leaving his parents and that town and all the pain he'd been through.

So I fell in with his brother, who turned out to be an abuser but once we had a kid I felt stuck. I didn't know how to save myself and couldn't ask for anyone else to save me. Jason came to visit us when the child was two. My husband always passed out early so we spent our evenings together. Jason asked me to grab makwa and run away but I was too afraid. We gave in to our desires one night and then I told him goodbye. He was barred from contacting me for as long as that marriage lasted.

Life went on, and 27 years after we had first fallen in love, we reconnected. I was bruised from my second divorce, he was suffering from another relationship gone wrong. We told each other that it was just old friends hanging out.

Then he showed up at my door, and I threw myself into his arms and all those years just melted away. I'd come home. I found what I hadn't even known I'd lost.