I am too afraid to say these things that need to be said, because the consequence of my demands might be another man leaving me, and my father taught me that my needs weren’t compelling enough to make a man stay. I am, then, a grown woman who struggles mightily to trust what it might mean for a man to stay, to show up, to catch me when I fall, acquainted as I am with the relief that comes when they finally, simply, go. The leaving feels like the tanks are finally pulling out. But also like I am on my own.
