Goodbye fairy tales. So long happy endings followed by music and credits. I’m here to tell you love is not enough. Love is the easy part. Love is the most dishonest part. Have you ever wrapped your arms around something that wanted to harm you? Do you remember squeezing so tight as you inhaled toxic fumes? It’s like a cancerous cigarette you can’t stop sucking on. The nicotine buzz has deceived you. You’re so used to the smell you’ve become noseblind to every other odor.
Years go by and you’re wide awake in your bed. The faint light of dawn creeps in through the window and the only hope you have is the person snoring next to you doesn’t wake up. Can you have just one fucking day of peace where some benign comment doesn’t turn into screams so loud the dog won’t stop barking?
The reality is, love is the first thing to come but it’s the last thing to go. Long after it has left the idea persists. It’s like a lingering cough. It’s like the way your eyes burn hours after you’ve run out of tears.
You ask yourself, “What happened?” You try to honestly assess where you’re to blame and where your partner is to blame. But no one has ever been saved by a postmortem. On the autopsy table, everything is cold and sterile. Maybe it is all your fault. Maybe it’s all theirs. Fucking run. Rip the covers off and get out as fast as you can. Don’t waste another second loving something that is killing you.
And it will hurt because the love is real. You’ll feel the urge to crawl back over some misguided sense of nostalgia. A text message will remind you of the better days. A smile will make you recall happier times. But that’s the buzz hiding the metastasizing tumors. You can’t ween yourself off love. You have to remove it like a dying limb and hope what grows back is stronger than before.
The Cerebral Sir 