I want to blame my job. I want to blame her, this place, all of it. But I won’t. I know it’s inaccurate, I know it’s not true. I’m just looking to place blame, to not take accountability, to find something that I can pinpoint and say “This is what pushed me over the edge. This is the reason.” Rather than blame myself.

I know it’s me.

I know I’m the problem.

I know that no one can fix be but myself, and that it’s no one’s fault but my own that I’m like this and still fucking struggling.

I should have asked for help a very long time ago.

Or I should have just finished the job right the first time.

Maybe it will get better.

Maybe it won’t.

Maybe -

Maybemaybemaybemaybe

I don’t want those that are blameless to feel guilty. Like they missed something. Like it’s their fault. I never asked for help. I hid it so well. What are you supposed to do if I never told you something was wrong, if I never asked you for help?

Is this a suicide note? Is it a vent? I don’t know right now. Could be either, I guess.

Don’t want her to fucking find me and blaming herself, nope that’d be my fault. For not... not asking for help well enough? I guess? How do I write out the sigh that just left my mouth? SIGH. sigh. Small.

I just want out.

I feel so. so. so.

Isolated? Alone? Lonely? Tired? Exhausted. Done. Scared. Terrified? Hopeless?

Why can’t I be the desperately and unconditionally loved hero of the story, who struggles and hides and fights, but is found anyway, is offered that support, is - is CODDLED?

I saw a TikTok yesterday. The person said “If the multiverse theory is real, then there’s a universe out there where I have reached my dream, am happy, still have them by my side. That comforts me.”

And that got me thinking, so here’s mine: If the multiverse theory is real, then there’s a universe out there - where I am loved dearly. Where I found my person, and they adore me, just as much as I adore them. That’s sort of comforting. I think. But also…

Why couldn’t that be this universe? Why couldn’t I have the universe where I found them? Where it all worked out? It’s. It’s not fair. I want that. Is that selfish? Am I not grateful enough? Do I have to be grateful at all? Is it self to desire a love I’ve never felt, only read about and longed for?

What a piece of shit I must be.

There's always my phone, tucked in my back pocket.

Chained down, dragging me, tethered to this Earth, connected, connected, connected, to everything - but floating, far away, can't see, blind and disconnected, disconnected, disconnected, from real.

I never used to carry keys around, I didn't have a car and lived at home. Still don't have a car, but my job requires me to carry a lot of keys. None of them belong to my house where I live alone. They sit on a clip on my belt, most of the time.

The clash of their metal bodies always in my ears, WHERE ARE MY KEYS, move, my hands are shaking and I can't find the right one, "you don't lock your house?", there's no point, stuck and stationary, still no car keys, so many things to unlock but still so locked up.

My wallet is often in my backpack, not on my person. It's the same wallet I've had for eight years, the first one I bought. As a teenager, I only carried cash in it. Then cards started to accumulate, and now it's so stiff and worn out, and I couldn't tell you half of the things that fill it.

Junk, junk, junk, where's my wallet, doesn't matter I can use my phone now, it reminds me of years ago, how is it still together, how is it holding on, the threads are bare and the leather sticky, I should get a new one - why, this one still works just fine.

My pocket knife joins my keys on my belt. I need it for work sometimes.

It's sharp, how sharp, let's see... oh god it, it, it - it's perfect for cutting the boxes - don't bring it with you, you're so obvious, but I need it for work, do I really, why did I buy it, it's pretty, it's sharp, like her and her and her, why am I not that way anymore?

I need to send my girlfriend a message asking for time and space to talk. I know if I just wait for "the right time" when we're already together, it's not going to happen.

I'm scared she'll be fed up with me.

I know I'm a lot.

My message says "If possible, I need you to save space to talk to me after you get back from town today. And if you can't hold space today, then tomorrow." I haven't sent it because I am scared. I'm scared she's going to reply with "now I'm anxious" or that she wants to do it now so she's not thinking about it all day, but she's at work right now and has errands to run in town later.

The last time I approached her at work and said I wanted to talk later (this was literally about nothing, but just I wanted to spend time actually talking), she said it made her anxious and she couldn't stop thinking about it. This time is not something I can talk to her about during work.

I know work is more important to her than our relationship.

She's told me in the past work is more important than anything, and that the biggest reason she broke up with her ex was after he gave her essentially an ultimatum about work. He said something like "when will you be done there so we can move back home" and she took that as a "choose between work and me". I'm fucking terrified she will think I'm doing that.

I don't want her to break up with me. I want to be the one to call it.

I don't want her to have that power - it scares me. I feel like if she were to break up with me, she would be fine. She'd be unaffected because I don't actually think I mean much to her. But if I break up with her, I have control of the situation, and it's my pain in my own hands, rather than letting her take it and hurt me. I will be the one to do it when it comes to be time. Not her. Because if I do it, I don't think she will expect it from me at all, and that means she will be hurt too.

I'm so selfish but I'm so sick of being the one to shut my mouth because I don't want to hurt someone else. I'm tired of being okay with it's inconvenient to another person for me not to be.

Anyways. I've rambled.

I really do want to tell her the things that are bothering me but I'm scared to do it. I feel like I have to preface it, tell her "I know work is more important, so I'm not trying to make you choose, that's not what I want. I just want you to know how I feel." But.

But.

But.

But.

What if this is her last straw with me. I'd like to try and change things first, work it out with her. I want to tell her flat out what bothers me, but I'm scared that if she thinks I want more time for us than she puts into work, she'll think I'm giving her an ultimatum. She has very, very, hard stances on her opinions.

One time, months ago, a mutual friend/former coworker said she could see us being together forever. And my girlfriend laughed and said, sort of off-handedly, while on her phone, "I don't know, I've got that ADHD, and that applies to people to."

I remember that shit word for words because stuff like that really, really effects me. Am I just for you to pass the time? Why did you make me feel special? Should I just let you read this instead of talking to you? Our friend, kind of gaped then looked at me and said "How do you feel about that?" and I don't remember what I said but I sort of laughed it off.

This happened so long ago, but every time I feel brushed off or pushed to the side, it floats its way back up front and center in my brain. Just to remind me I'm temporary. She'll get bored. She never intended for this to last. Next time someone better, more fun, more interesting comes along.

I miss when she used to say she was attracted to me.

I feel so.

Usable?

This is almost like what my ex boyfriend did, but at least he didn't make me feel like I was at fault all the time.

I wish she had never kissed me. I remember her driving me home every night this time last year, when we were doing a movie marathon together for a week. The flirting used to be a joke, until it wasn't, and I remember being in the dark in the car just chanting in my head "don't kiss me, don't kiss me, don't kiss me" because I knew it would mess everything up. It did too. I really wish she hadn't.

Now, I feel stupid writing this. I'm fucking waxing poetic, on what I feel like I don't have the right to call pain. If I were to tell her all this, word for word, I can hear her saying "how was I supposed to know?"

Guess I'll find out.

My girlfriend is always very adamant about communication and being clear, which is something I struggle with heavily. Communicating my needs, boundaries, or even things that happen between us that make me not feel great. But it feels like every time I bring things up that have bothered me, or I've misinterpret, or things she's said - it's my fault.

It's always my fault.

I'm the bad communicator. If I had said something sooner, if I had done whatever different. I'm at fault for misreading the messages because she "would never be passive aggressive" so when I bring up that it felt that way, it's my fault for feeling that way. And I understand that I'm in control of my own emotions, but when I tell her something like that, I'm not looking for an admonishment, I'm looking for a validation on how it felt. Is it always my fault no matter what? Is that reasonable?

She gets so defensive and has to be in the right always, that it means whatever went wrong was my fault. My misunderstanding, my miscommunication, my lack of understanding. It makes me feel sick sometimes to think I'm actually that bad at communicating. And I've been trying to be better about it by being more honest and open for almost a year now, but being honest only seems to make me more upset in the end. The problem in the beginning was me not wanting to tell her when things bothered me because I didn't want to be a problem or annoying, but that led to problems too. So I started being more honest, but it feels like she's telling me that I'm not allowed to be upset at things that make me upset.

No matter what: she's not at fault. And maybe that's true? But it really feels like we're both to blame sometimes or maybe occasionally it's not me and it is her? I don't know. I'm just frustrated that it feels like I'm not allowed to be upset at her because she doesn't make mistakes, but if I keep the feelings in she gets upset at me for not communicating them when I needed to.

I was probably fiffteen, a little stupid, and a little more than lovestruck. I had a crush on this boy, who had become somewhat of my bestfriend. It wasn't to be though, as he had a partner already. We'd still flirt and hang out all the time, and yeah, maybe he'd lead me on a bit, but I kind of liked it.

I think it was Halloween night. Myself, him, and two of our other friends were all in his basement passing around a sole hard cidar (as you do at fifteen) and one of those flavored vapor pens that have a set amont of puffs. We thought we were so cool. We had been messing around the whole evening and were piled around some beanbag chairs.

I'm not sure how it came up, but I said I'd never had my first kiss before.

He said, "Wait - you haven't?"

I shook my head.

He leaned across the beanbag between us and said, "Come here."

I leaned over, we kissed, and... that's it.

My face turned beat red and he was smiling, but that's... it. For the next five years I endured the worst possible, toxic, rubber-band relationship with him. On and off, lies and half-truths, it was horrible.

I'm twenty-two now, but... I won't forget my first kiss. I'll forget about him someday, hopefully, but I loved my first kiss.

Why should I apologize for the stumble in my step, or the fumble of my words or the shake in my hands?

I always laugh, apologizing for my misstep, my mumbled words.

My hands shake, my legs jitter, and my voice wavers, and these things belong to me. No, I didn't have some great tradgey to make me this way. I did not chose to move gracelessly, like a child unfit for their legs. This is who I have become, unrefined edges, stuttered words for a mind that races too fast.

Why should I aplogize for me?

"She's not coming back!" He screamed.

You freeze, you insides coiling and turning to stone. Your eyes are wide.

He sighs, looks away. "I'm sorry. She's not. So please stop acting like one day we'll wake up and she'll be standing there like nothing ever happened."

You flex your fingers, swallow the dry lump in your throat and look at your feet. Your words are stuck on your tongue, where they glued themselves the moment he opened his mouth to yell. It's not like you didn't know this. You know she'll never return. She can't step through that door like she always did, smiling, with a joke already on it's way out her month.

"I'm sorry," You rasp. "I... I know she's not. I guess - I like thinking someday she may. It's easier."

He looks at you out the corner of his eyes. You can see words dance across his eyes, until they fade, and something colder sets in. His hands disappear into his pockets. "Well you shouldn't. It doesn't do any good. She's never coming back, and you have to get over it."

1. rough, calloused fingers, gently running through soft black fur. a purr. and a smile.

2. the sun - warm, melting into your skin. the grass - whispering against your arms.

3. two hands, wound together.

4. sweater sleeves, falling and covering curled fingers.

5. fluffy hair, early in the morning. it smells like soap and sleep.

6. blinking awake, the morning sun on your face. your limbs sprawled across the bed, covered in blankets.