When she died, a friend said, “…write. That had helped me once.” The thing is, she didn’t know I was battling other feelings, other monsters and those came out. She didn’t know I had done this before when you left that evening. Such a classic way too. I now don’t remember what your excuse was. I don’t remember if we were old enough for cell phones. I remember you never came back. Not that night. Not ever. At least not the same way. And that left me a kind of broken that I never healed from. Maybe that’s where I should go back to.
She tried. She went to you. At least that’s what she told me. The humiliation- it must have been. I made the whole thing all about you. All about you. You taught me the biggest lesson of all. To look out for myself. You taught me there was no value in pride- at least not enough that I should cut my own nose to spite my face. You are why today I survived this marriage. You taught me the vile side of me. You taught me to lie and cheat. You taught me a me that I would never heal from. You were why I left him. You were why I never quite got into anyone else. Did you know? You were also why I eventually stopped pining for a sibling. You were why my first rift with her started. You were why my lackadaisical relationship with him started. You brought out the rebel in me. I think you brought out the rebel in all of us. All of us. You left a hole that never quite healed. You taught me labels were shit yet there we were. You taught me about friendships and my first taste of poly. You have taught me life lessons no one else did. And you know the funny thing, if you somehow came back today, with all my hatred and anger and revenge, I will take you back. I will hurt you and bite your head off, like I have in the past but I will take you back first. You are why I quit my family.
“No one wanted me” is what you told me. That’s why you were adopted. But you were wanted though. I get it now. You were difficult. You were a rebel. You were wanted and you wanted other things. You are a father now. Do you get it now? Do you understand marriage a little better? Divorce? Children? What they want? What we wanted?
You were loved. Deeply. By a lot of people. It was not the time and place for people like me. You knew I did not fit in. In that family, in that college, in that village, sometimes in that city, in that country. Those were not my people. You were my people. And then you were lost. I don’t know if you fit in there or with me. I don’t know when you fit where. I am confused about a lot of people and I dislike most. I don’t know where that leaves me. But every so often, I will meet someone whose fingers or forehead or smile or eye roll or the way they care about one thing or joke about another is just like you.
Oh, the hurt it took to get over your pain. And the people I have hurt in between.
“tumi mayer motoi bhalo? ami eklati poth hati.”
Save As Draft 