It’s been building for a while. The dissatisfaction I feel is a constant ache. I know I’m supposed to be somewhere else doing something else, maybe even being with someone else, but here I am with you. I wonder if it’s a waste of time, but when we’re together everything else is unimportant. I am absorbed in you.It's like I serve myself on a golden platter. Take me, all of me.
As I’m lying in bed watching you sleep, discontent gnaws at me. I can’t see my way clear, but a part of me doesn’t want to. As long as I think I make you happy, that’s all that matters to me.
Or it did, until today.
As I watch you sleep, I think about the things you said and it occurred to me that I’m just a face and body in a long line of faces and bodies. Some you like less than me and some you like more. I don't dare mention love, because it dawned on me that you don't love me. This is just a game for you and nothing more.
I study your beautiful face in this half light and know it’s not a healthy relationship, maybe not even a relationship, but I'm not blaming you. I accept that this is my choice. I had a chance to walk away and didn’t. I’ve had career opportunities come my way but let them escape just to spend a morning with you, an evening with you, a day or an hour or two. Things you would never have done had the situation been reversed. You're too self-sufficient and self-assured. Time we spend together has always been on your terms. I ask myself what might have happened if I hadn’t decided to blow off the appointment to go to bed with you today. What might have happened if I had turned left instead of right the day we met. I feel so dumb, having given you the licence without checking to see whether you should take hold of the wheel.
You snore just once and turn away. Here is my moment. I slide out of bed, pick up my clothes and tiptoe towards the door, dress quickly and quietly in the bathroom and slip out of your apartment and out of your life.
Driving away down the long road from your home, my vision is tear-blurred. I can barely think straight. I don’t want to leave you, but can’t stay. Why prolong the inevitable?
I pull over to the side of the road and collect my thoughts. Fingers are poised over the keys on my phone. I wonder briefly if leaving you is a mistake, but I know it's not.
I text:
Thanks for the fun. B
I block your number in case you try to contact me. It would be so easy to glide back to you, as I have done. You would, of course, be oblivious to my inner turmoil. The need I feel. The looming, explosve drama that would ensue. Perhaps you've faced this before in other lovers who want more of you than you can give. I don't even want to think of how you dealt with them. I have to think of me, for once.
Giving up an addiction is never easy, but I must.
I wish they had groups like AA to help with my kind of recovery.
