youve come full circle and now youre free

ive made the separation, he says, laying next to me in bed, his chest against my side, one hand holding mine and i feel defeated because this means im lagging behind, i havent fully separated and i thought i had. im surprised its so easy to hear him say.

if i had i would have made my flight back to santiago. i wouldnt be here thinking this was something to fight for, id have realized there was no longer a struggle, no longer a fight.

he says, we need to have a serious talk about this, words no one wants to hear and i can feel him in the darkness, brace himself, exhausted, (hes thought something through for once), im sorry im being so blunt, he continues, his hands still holding mine, but i stop him, remind him, this is how it has to be now, you have to say what you mean, i just dont know how you can mean it when you say it that way.

i dont cry for long or very hard, just tears that make a quick escape and are gone, wiped clean and absorbed into his sheets which smell heavily slept in but not just by him and its unnerving.

you still taste like beeswax, he had said, smiling, (my heart breaking) over drinks at the corner bar we had gone to my last night in BA back in april, what i didnt know would be our last night together, and i cant help think of when we used to smell like that, our kisses. the tin of burts bees he had given me on the ride to the airport in february, 7am and raining, youll need this, he had said. and i had, i used it all the time and it never seemed to get empty, to disappear, and i used to think it was magic, like us, filling up and keeping me safe.
when we broke up i set it in the sun on my desk, in the window, let it get buried in my abalone shell under jewelry and coins from all over south america. i tried to forget about it, about him, that smell, i let it go rotten in the sun and somehow that seemed appropriate too.

i finally got to touch you. something i have been thinking about for months, wanted to do so badly some nights my own skin ached and i scratched at my arms and struggled with the sheets and sweat your name in tiny beads down my back. i felt for the first time what it was to long for someone, my body felt that word for months. so many days i thought of what it would be like to see you and then there you were and it hurt to be near you. stomach churning, skin pricked up, eyes burning everytime they met yours, not longer than a few seconds at a time. it hurt to be near you, that was all i had thought about and now i just wanted to run. run. run.

my last day in buenos aires, i go to the zoo and holucaust museum while i wait for my bus back to santiago, the only two things i can think of that are more depressing than leaving my ex boy on the streets of a city we were last in together when we were still in love. i try to get distracted, feel sorry for the animals, try really hard to feel upset at the pictures of people, entire families, with such looks of desperation but i cant and i feel selfish which makes it all worse. i sit in the botanical gardens by myself and cry, big gasping hollow loud sobs until my chest aches, people stare and i just keep taking pictures of cats.

how is this my life, i keep asking myself? how did it all go away so fast? is the question i couldnt bring myself to ask. how did it just slip away?
i know i couldnt have done anything differently although i sure whould have tried if i knew, if i thought it would have made a difference or change his mind. its hard to tell its the end until it is, and then its just the end and its terribly sad.


the last night you had put a pillow on my lap, layed your head on it and slept. i ran my fingers through your hair, which is long now, longer than ive ever seen it, and i pressed my palm over your forehead, scratched your neck, massaged your temples and it was such a small, seemingly insignificant thing but it was so meaningful to me. how many nights had we layed there, just like that, how much did i love to touch you, to watch you sleep and smile and curl up closer to me. the ease in which two people who really know each other can just be, just be with each other is enough to break me. i pulled my hand back and went back to my book. you only stirred slightly before falling back to sleep and i didnt touch you again until morning.


i leave him again on some street corner in buenos aires but its so very different this time. i dont cry because im so desperately sad without him, or because i dont want to leave, or because i cant wait to see him again, because i love him so much i cant stand to be apart, or because i think what we have is so special and amazing and i cant live without it. i cry because i know it will be the last time i do this, the last time i leave him in BA, that this is where that love stays. i walk away and i turn myself off, my heart just snaps shut and everything inside of me changes.

i'll never forget anything, hes telling me, hands on each of my shoulders and the wind whips around my face and im grateful for sunglasses and the street traffic distraction as he searches for something better to say and there is nothing, its so terrible, were just memories now, were just old apartments and kisses and promises and stories well tell to other people. things well always remember but never feel again, things, that after time, just become things, spaces to be filled up by new memories, new people and so many things well most likely forget and it seems its already begun.

you used to say forever, remember that?