He Don't

  He sat on his porch with a sauce pot, lighter, bottle of lighter fluid and a box of memories. He wandered if this act would bring him any closure. If destruction in the physical form would bring about healing in the spiritual. While he held that first letter in his hand, he thought back to the time when it was written. When that developing relationship was so new. When they were so excited to be in each others presence. The texts, calls, dates, and nights in. How they would cuddle, hold each others hand, and share pillow talk till they fell asleep. Then he thought about her and the one she was with now. He pictured him sharing those same experiences. His fingers interlaced with hers, on the same bed, spooning and sharing pillow talk as they once did. He tore the letter into pieces, threw it in the pot, repeated the process with various other cards, pictures, and letters, drowned it in lighter fluid and watched it burn.

 

 

  He didn’t want to be replaced. To be replaced is to fail. To be replaced is to be seen as inadequate, and insufficient for whatever title or position you once were fit to hold. When something is replaced, the old is discarded, and the new moves in to proclaim it’s new surroundings as it’s home. He did not want to loose his home. Although he was more so content with the fact that he had lost his home, it was the fact that someone was now taking his place that drove him to his current chore.

 

   He watched as each picture bubbled, curled and took various shapes under the fire. Listened as each letter and card crackled while turning to ash. In the end he knew that this would accomplish nothing. That at the end of the day he would be left with nothing less than his aching memories, and a damaged pot. But he would not end this day without finding a fraction of peace in one form of fashion or another.

 

 

   Sitting on his steps, elbows dug in his thighs, and head in his palms, he doubted his replacements’ ability to hold permanence while walking in the same shoes as he once did. He identified all his flaws, both character and physical. Then his strengths, and compared them both with his own. He looked back at the fire, took what was left from the memory box, and threw it in the pot in whole. With a slightly pleasurable smirk, he continued to watch it burn.