Shattered Love

falling in love for all the wrong reasons but with all the right outcomes

I could see his breath. White like his soul. As if he was breathing the life out of himself. And then I saw my breath too. Felt it on my lips like a pathetic sigh. I could see that his eyes were open, but he was looking down. His eyelashes and cheeks were covered in frost like the icy paint brush of winter had dripped upon his wounded soul. A shiver swept across my body as the chill crawled upon me, too. I heard him breath again, and I attempted to speak but my lips were stiff.

It was tragic, really. How beautiful that morning was. The trees dusted in white powder and the sky lit a tired white. I know it was beautiful because his eyes couldn’t compare, but maybe that was because the life was being drained from them. They looked distressed. The ground was dead somewhere underneath a suffocating pillow of snow. He seemed to be so far away.

I spoke. My voice sounded so distant. So frail. His eyes shot up to meet mine. I could see the torment within them. He could no longer hide it in the bitter cold.

He replied and his voice was strong, and unexpected. I had already forgotten what I had said mere seconds ago.  The world was so still. I blinked, and it must have been unfamiliar because he got up and came to me. Effortlessly, he lifted me and positioned me on his lap. He pressed me into his chest, and I could sense the heat of his breath feeling its way down my neck and back. And I drifted. Drifted somewhere between life and death. Sane and insane.

It hurt. So badly that it stabbed into my soul. The thought of how I loved him. I knew that he loved me too. Yet here we were. Two cold souls, only holding each other because they had to. And it hurt. To know that I had to love him in order to realize things about myself. But God, did I love him, and I wish that he had discovered things about himself as I did. I saw what he couldn’t. I had hoped to pick up his broken pieces and glue them back together. I wanted to be the one to save him, but it was foolish. I was foolish, and I fell in love with all the shattered pieces. Why could I not love my own pieces first?

The answer was so simple. I wanted him to love my broken heart like I loved his. Though when he did it was painful because I didn’t feel any more whole. I tried to feel complete again. Maybe I loved him too much or he didn’t love me enough to help him realize his emptiness too. It felt so beautiful to be held by him, but not all things in beauty are perfect. He was meant to help me grow, nothing more, and that was what wounded me the most.