The Vault (a poem and prose collection)

Fourteen

You stared at me for five seconds before sighing. Your eyes are still on their expressive browns and I can't manage to look away. I can't manage to look away even i am slowly starting to realize something will change today. You forward two steps to me.

"Look, treating you better is different from loving you, Alex. The thing is i just want you to be treated better, everybody should be but..." you trailed off unable to say the next words. I am sure you know what you want to say because you always do and i am sure you're just protecting my feelings and i inwardly swear because even I'm at the verge of tearing apart, i can't fucking look away.

"I'm not the right person to love you."

I can hear a breaking, not sure if it's my cat doing wonders in the kitchen or it's just my heart. Your eyes are roaming in every corners of my face and i wonder if that's how you knew me so well. That the past four months of being with you, you didn't even struggled to jump depths through my soul, you just sat there with your sharp eyes and mischievous smiles. It was effortless. You came like a lightning, swift but beautifully cruel and penetrating.

I am not the right person to love you.

You always have a thing with words. Your edges are made of poetries you write and i wonder if you used it to inject the ache with anaesthetic. You could've just said "i don't love you" goddamnit you could've said it that way than giving me the thoughts that you really do, you're giving me spiraling possibilities of the unknown it's just that there are other things through it.

I smiled at you because I've gone this far in front of you watching myself melt with your eyes and your words, not knowing which feelings to recognize. And i still couldn't take my eyes away from your stupid pretty face.

You didn't smiled back.

"I love you."

Worry is written all over your face. And i can feel my thumping organ being held with warmth. I guess I'm gonna miss you.

I pat your head and laughed as you flinched. Your face is still worried.

"We're moving to London." I blurted.

"Is that today?" she asked while playing her left index finger, a coping mechanism of her anxiety.

I nodded. "Anyway, i should go. Mum kept on texting me about buying Marshall's food."

"Okay...will you be...are you okay?"

I crossed my arms while staring at her. I want to put her in my pocket and take her with me.

"I will be."

She forced a smile. I memorized the outline of her face thinking it would help me get over this quicksand of feelings i feel for her. Dumb ironic. I turned around knowing I can't do the same to the portraits of her that I've drawn.

I can't promise to get over someone who effortlessly made me hope over life again. Walking away from someone that important isn't going to be so easy as dusting off. But i will always call you home, haven.

I think it's a privilege to have my heart broken by you.

— nana