on the last embrace-

that day i ran into you, more like you walking in the direction of me as i stood there trying to pick my chin up from the ground as gravity became too much under the weight of reality and i thought of all those long months that had passed by where there were days and weeks even you never left my thoughts.

i remember how i grew scared of the thought that maybe this would be the life i live for the next however many years God grants me on this earth, and that scared the life out of me. literally, it felt like i had stopped living and was merely surviving day after day after hopeless day. i remember waking up one morning in paris and feeling as if i had just spoken to you, as if i had felt you next to me instead of 3,400+ miles away. that dream was so vivid so tangible that i woke reaching for you as another one of those weights pressed against my chest- as they so often do- this time resembling more of acupuncture, a thousand pins poking at my achy heart- or so i imagine acupuncture feeling that way. except at the time it felt more like torture than therapy.

fast-forward three months and a half, then rewind three days from today; i didn't expect our collision to be less beautiful than i had written. though, beautiful things are often under the covering of the less appealing. and this time was certainly less than. less than pleasant, less than kind, less than sincere. how do two people once so known by each other become strangers? it happens slowly, then all at once.

i somehow managed to pick my chin up from the ground, gathering the courage to speak when i would have so rather walk away. but then you did that thing you've always been so good at, making moments less awkward and easing the nerves that often overwhelm me and that's one of the reasons i fell in love with you. it was okay, i was okay until you brought up that intimate night.

"did you journal? can i read yours?"

just us, in that crowd of four, we were the only souls sharing that memory. and it is a beautiful memory. but memories are just that, a thing of the past. and it was in said moment i realised: you too are a thing of the past. so i walked away, you beckoning for one last embrace and i wonder, did you know it would be our last?

fast-forward three months and a half, then rewind two days from today: i saw you one more time after our last embrace. you stood across the room hands held high and i sent up one last prayer with you in my presence. i didn't know if that would be the last time i would stand in a room with you there, but i knew that if it was or even if it wasn't, i'd be okay. even more, you'd be okay. we'd be okay without each other. as seasons end they give birth to new ones, the sun rises at the same time but in different places, and the moon is the same size everywhere. i learned all of that across a vast sea.

i walked out of that room without knowing if it would in fact be the very last time i saw you on this earth, and i was okay with that.

fast-forward to this moment right here as i type these words... i am still okay. you may be thinking okay is less than ideal, but for me it is such a feat after wondering if i'd ever get to anything more than surviving. and i did, i am. it happened slowly, then all at once.

it was on that day i ran into you, it was then i knew i had already let you go.