This is the reason I haven't been able to write much else but heartbreak.


March 2010

A moment of possibility- he looks at you, expectantly. A hundred doubts flutter in your vodka-lined stomach; you take a step towards him as he stands out on the poorly-lit patio.

"Hey," he says, and you analyse the depth of his feelings in the tone of his voice, searching for meaning in a single syllable. You want it to feel profound, but it doesn't. He is smoking again, drumming his free hand on the wrought-iron table- maybe in time with the music, but you wouldn't know, because the only thing you can hear is the question in his eyes.

"We need to talk" sounds ominous even to your own ears, so you don't blame him for the terror in his baby blues. He waits for you to continue but now the words are stuck in your throat. You tell yourself it could all work out. You tell yourself to man up, to be brave, for God's sake. Say it. Say it.

You start to stutter something unintelligible and your heart skips as his eyes scan your face in an adorable display of his oblivious bewilderment. This is all going horribly wrong, because somewhere deep down you always wished that he'd get it in one look and make the move himself and it'd be a perfect fairytale moment... but that's not real at all, is it? He doesn't look swept away. You are still prevaricating over how to say it right. There is no poetry left in this moment.

"Talk about what?" he asks you, finally. Now he has asked you know you have to say it; when you finally manage to complete a coherent sentence, your declaration strikes you as honest but inelegant. You suppose that can't really be helped.

"I think about you all the time," you say. "I can't just carry on being your friend and pretending there's nothing more to it. I'm sorry. I had to tell you."

The silence is deafening. You wish he'd say something, anything to break the terrible stillness of the moment, but for the first time ever he is lost for words. Somehow in the awful quiet, you realise what you had dreaded all along, because the discomfort in the nuances of his facial expression points to impossibility. Game over.

Hope shatters in slow motion. Your heart gradually splinters and cracks, like paint being peeled with eerie calmness from the wall. It doesn't matter that you've read this scenario a hundred times in a hundred angst-ridden romance novels, or that your friends have tried their hardest to convince you that he doesn't deserve you if he's dumb enough not to want you. Nothing can stop the torrents of self-loathing drenching the spark of your optimism; it's like someone turned out the lights and punched you in the gut. This hurts beyond belief.

"I had no idea," he says eventually; of course not, why the hell would he? You force yourself to remember that you knew he was clueless, but it smarts, even when you know that you're only angry because his response is so disappointing.

"I know," you say, and you listen while he extracts well-meant platitudes from his brilliant mind- ;I just want to be friends', 'it's not you, it's me, honestly', and worst of all, 'there's someone out there perfect for you, but it's not me'. You nod with ice in your veins- it's a numbness that has absolutely nothing to do with the temperature. For the first time in your life you have allowed yourself to be vulnerable, and the fallout is a special kind of humiliating; you have no idea what to say, or whether to say anything at all.

You could be anyone. He could be anyone. A hundred possibilities and they all end right here; no matter what he says you know that it will never be any different to this moment, this pain, this regret. Maybe one day you will change your mind and maybe hope isn't lost for good, but that isn't what you need to hear. Maybe, though, just maybe, you will be okay. Maybe you need to be able to shatter to appreciate the boy who will put you back together. A moment of possibility; it will come again, I promise. Maybe it's hard, but you are stronger than this, and you have to believe it.

Maybe next time love won't be such a fucking disappointment.

It's possible, isn't it?