He showed me love that I hadn’t felt in what seemed like forever. The kind of love that crawls into your skin, lives in your shoes and listens to your favorite music. As quickly as it was given, it was taken. At some point I thought I would do anything for this man, maybe it was delusion, the love I had been withholding from myself because I thought I didn’t deserve it. My company, my reflection, wasn’t worthy of an emotion this deep.
You were there the night I got black out drunk and threw up for hours, you held the trash can, wiped the spit off my mouth and told me I looked beautiful. You cleaned my blood off the bathroom tile and you laughed when I peed on your leg because you stood guard while I squatted behind a tree in the park, you folded my laundry while I was at work and made sure all the shirts faced the same direction in the dresser. When you left all I could think about were the physical ways in which you had shown me love. I wanted someone, anyone to make me feel deserving of that kind of love. I let you into my life, despite the hesitation, and the doubts you had, it meant nothing to me because I was getting something I had wanted for so long.
Before you, I drove myself home after a late night out, I cleaned the throw up out of my trash can the morning after. Picked myself up off the floor during a crippling panic attack and found comfort in my solitude. I didn’t realize that I had been doing these things for myself before anybody had ever inserted themselves into my life. Now that I know those are acts of love, I see all the ways in which I’ve been quietly loving myself. I hope he knows if it wasn’t him, I would have fallen in love with somebody else only to come to the same realization. I have been here for myself longer than anybody ever has or ever will. While he continues to chase mirrors, looking for his reflection in-between the legs of somebody, anybody. I’ll be staring back at my reflection falling in love with myself over and over again. So one day I can look in the mirror and confidently say “I did this for you.”
allaboutbeingalive 