Promise Me Not

by Meagan Brandy

To those living with the weight of regret, you are not alone. For there is no life without lessons and no love without loss. Be kind to yourself as the clouds shall clear.

There’s no one to hover, no one to pretend to be fine in front of when all you want to do is freak the fuck out every now and then—because it’s not like it’s all the time.

That’s the thing about grief and the million other emotions flickering through me, though, right? It messes with my mind in a single blink. It can be a memory or a feeling or a sight. A song, a single word, or even a damn snack. Everything is fine, sometimes better than fine…until it isn’t. Until guilt dirties it, or anger buries it, or fear wraps its vicious claws around and chokes it.

“Just so you know,” he begins. “It’s okay not to be okay…even if it’s not for the reason everyone thinks.”

You’ll never change the score if you don’t dare to make the pass, right?

This is what friends are for, to understand that even if you say you don’t want them around, they know you’re better off when they are.

“Sometimes people fight against things because they’re afraid of how they’ll play out.”

They just stand there, staring into each other’s eyes with a look akin to longing, which is crazy because they’re together. But I guess that’s the thing about finding that one person who was meant to be yours. There’s no such thing as too close. No such thing as too much. No such thing as letting go.

People think they know how you should act or feel, how long you should mourn, when you should be better, and how hard the entire process will be, but they don’t. They couldn’t possibly. Sure, it’s different for everyone, but at the end of the day, the base is the same. You lost something, or something was stolen from you. You want it back. Maybe it’s possible, or maybe it’s impossible, but that doesn’t mean the person with a chance hurts any less than the person without one. It just means we’re human and both must try. Try and live with the hole, or try and fill it. Or do nothing and get buried beneath it all.

Just because our pain is different, that doesn’t mean his isn’t as deep as mine. We both may have lost what was supposed to be our future, but maybe there’s a purpose behind it all. A way to make us stronger than we would have been.

All I can do is weather the storm and hope when the clouds clear and the sun rises, I’ll still have the strength to stand.

Maybe leaving is human nature or simply a stage of life. Plain and simple? People leave. They love you and they leave you, with or without their own consent.