Changing Seasons
The curtain of spring’s rain shut on seven years of my life. Seven. Long. Years. Full of whispered good mornings with his taste still on my lips from the night before, full of lazy afternoons spent watching meaningless television, full of long nights spent twirling round and round stuck on neverending sadness-go-round arguments, full of loving hands wiping away tears, full of mundane conversations about nothing, full of headaches and regrets and secrets.
The summer’s heat bore down on my back as I trudged through the garbage and muck and regret and fear and anger and jealousy of one-ness. Lost in a sandy, dry identity crisis. Who am I if I’m not his? How long before the vultures circle the abandoned carcus whose arms once made me feel whole and safe? Frantic panic attacks. I shouldn’t have let him go. I shouldn’t have let him go. I shouldn’t have pushed him away. I’ll be alone. I’ll be alone. I’ll be alone be alone be alone be alone. Forever. A long, dry summer, the tears of spring dried up and gone.
And then… the fall. The beginning of fall. I awake to a chilly nose, pull the covers up over my shoulder. Alone in my bed I provide my own warmth. I don’t miss him. I don’t miss man. I’m focused on me. My needs. What I want and who I am and who I want to be. And where I am, right now. In my own bed. I don’t care where anyone else is. I’m happy to know exactly where I am.
I tell my friends. I know what I want. I want a man… who will challenge me. Who won’t give me everything I ask for. Who will love me passionately at the right moments. Who can make me laugh one moment and have me moaning the very next. Who knows what he wants and pursues it. Who will respect my independence. A man I respect. But I don’t want that man for at least a year.
You know what I’m about to tell you, reader.
You know what happens next.
I meet him. The man I’ve been describing. Within weeks of speaking him into being. And now…
