Box of Chocolates

People come into our lives because they have something to teach us. I didn’t know what that meant for sure until I had it firsthand. One particular person passed by my life and punched a hole in my heart. A huge one, and not just in my heart, in my dreams, my future, my utter positive belief in life altogether.  

Ever seen the movie Repo Men? The way Jude Law and Forrest Whittaker rip out a man’s insides because the artificial implant is to be repossessed by the Union. The victims had nothing to pay for it anymore, hence their implants taken out and most of them were left for dead. I had a similar predicament only that it wasn’t anything artificial but my real heart. Figuratively, I had nothing to pay for it anymore because I didn’t have anything left in me for him to love me. I was simply reduced to nothing not even a wee bit significant. Cliche as it may sound, I felt like my heart has been ripped out of my chest and shredded to pieces. I died but was brought back to the living world, lifeless. My whole world has been swept away, along that my dreams of a happy family, even a daughter named Isabela, when we were ready to start our own family (and our kids will always have toys, he’d always say). Dreams of a simple house, a home nonetheless filled with laughter, freedom to be ourselves and to grow together each passing day. The promise that every time we are apart for more than a day, we trust that we are together in spirit and distance is nothing anymore. The places that we wanted to go to and the landmarks that we wanted to see. The future that we have always wanted to make up for, because we shared a similar past and we swore that we would make our future the happiest we can ever achieve it to be. But… 

It just simply ended with a but. 

But.

And you know it’s not good when there is a ‘but’. One reason after another and it was all over after that.

Each day I wake up to, I always have that one reason why I wanted to defy common sense and try to establish contact. I want to say that I miss the kisses, the hugs, how I am reminded that simple gestures have made me so happy. How a warm embrace erases all worries and everything will be better. I get caught up in reminiscing and when I’m on the verge of doing so, I stop. I know that I’m not with him anymore because there are far more reasons why I shouldn’t than should. I’m back on my feet again, and less tears each time. 

Now, I have reduced that memory to a mere life’s lesson. People do come into our lives to make us a better version of ourselves. Before, I was so uptight. I was always so precise about what my life should come to. I get the thrill out of knowing what’s at the end and how exactly to get there. He found it boring. He gets a kick out of life by living it a day at a time. I didn’t actually know it possible until I met him. And I learned how to see life the way he did. The uptightness has been shed and replaced by shreds of thrill for the unknown. I was still me, just a tad uptight and half a free spirit. He taught me how to be carelessly free.

My past has always haunted me. He is the only one I’ve had the confidence of telling everything in detail. I took him to my world and made him feel how I felt every time  I close my eyes and return to those memories. No matter how numb it got, little by little I regained that sensation of being loved and how to trust again. And it was all that mattered. My adversities weren’t adversities anymore but just forks in the road. I was made to realize that those weren’t meant to put us down but to make us learn how we should see things. It’s all up to the beholder what those are. Those weren’t meant to be wallowed over. Those were meant to be bounced from and go resilient overtime. He cheered me on as I try to brave through my nightmares. Time and again, it was gradually replaced by sighs as we slow-danced through it whispering all will be great from now on.

I’ve thought of a million reasons why he should be with me. That’s just math. I’ve learned that there isn’t supposed to be. It just is. In his words, if we’re supposed to be together we’ll find each other one day. I won’t set my hopes on that. I would rather focus on not knowing what’s in store for me than look forward to something that might or might not happen. He taught me that. Come to think of it, he taught me what might have been a prelude to securing my emotions, eventually my sanity. And to be well armored when false hopes are at bay. And it worked great.

He will always be loved. He was that someone whom I brought down my walls to, same as he had brought down his walls for me. I’ll always cherish that, and it will always be that something special I would keep that’s solely his. 

With that, I am putting everything in the past now. I have made myself happier knowing that each and every day I wake up to is a new thrill. I’ve learned to live each day at a time, and with regard to what I want in full. He is now a memory, albeit close to my heart, but a memory still. 

People come to our lives for a reason. They leave because that same reason has manifested itself in us and it ceases to be a reason for them to stay any longer. But these people will never fade, they will always become a memory that we can always go back to. And it will bring a smile, probably laughter and most likely a sigh.

As I hold my heart and close my eyes, I see that memory still. I can come back home whenever I wanted to. 

For now.