You broke up with me on March third.
I remember it
the way people remember disasters—
where they were,
what they were wearing,
the exact moment
their world split open.
Four years of friendship.
Bodies that knew each other by memory.
Nine months of calling it love.
On May tenth,
we would have made it a year.
But we didn't.
As someone with BPD,
you were my favorite person.
Not just someone I loved—
you were gravity.
North.
Home.
And when you left,
everything inside me collapsed.
I suffered so badly
I almost followed the darkness.
I could hear death knocking.
I could feel the cold
reaching for me,
trying to wrap itself around my shoulders.
I had never known pain like that.
I kept saying,
"I'm sorry."
I kept trying to fix it,
trying to tape together something
that had shattered into dust.
You needed space.
But my mind couldn't understand space.
It only understood loss.
So I kept reaching for you.
I tried to stop.
I really did.
But I kept going back.
And you kept blocking doors,
and I kept looking for windows.
Because I didn't just lose a relationship.
I lost my best friend.
Three months later,
we spoke again.
You only wanted sex.
I said yes.
I thought I was over you.
I wasn't.
I had simply buried my feelings alive.
Because every man I met
was measured against you.
Every conversation,
every laugh,
every touch
somehow circled back to your name.
Then you came back,
and what had once been a hole
became a crater.
After one night,
I asked you,
"How do you do this?
How do you touch old wounds
and not make them bleed again?
Is there a tutorial?
A twelve-step program?
Teach me."
Because I still love you.
And it isn't enough.
It isn't enough to see you.
It isn't enough to touch you.
It isn't enough to have pieces of you
for an hour or two.
Because then you get dressed.
And you leave.
You say,
"Till next time."
And I want to ask,
"Can next time be now?
Can you stay?"
I want to lay my head on your chest.
I want to hold you.
I want to remember what home felt like.
But the door closes.
And I am empty again.
I am a car running on fumes,
and every time you come over,
you fill my tank.
But there's a hole in it.
Everything leaks out.
And I am stranded again.
I know seeing you is hurting me.
I know letting you go might save me.
But loving you has convinced me
that losing you
would end me.
So I keep opening the door.
And for a little while,
before everything breaks again,
I get to see my best friend.