On letting go

Long after the rupture, I kept a photo of you in my wallet. I came to realize this about two months after, when as I was buying a pack of gum, or shampoo or maybe bananas. Something ordinary. I was simply going about my day, when suddenly your face unwillingly popped into my line of vision.

My heart fluttered and I hated myself for it.

I looked at the photo in disbelief. Small, monochromatic and threatening. Your eyes were piercing, and my left lobe did its job but too well. Remembering, unfortunately is much too easy. I did something, in that moment, that surprised me. I tucked the photo back into a corner of my wallet where it couldn't be easily seen, but would be kept close nonetheless. Like a token. As if it meant something, even though deep down, I knew better.

I did it anyway.

Long after the rupture, I kept a photo of you in my wallet. Days passed, and as you travelled by my side, things began to change. I learned to skate. I went to therapy. I played my clarinet after four years of neglect. I bought a different kind of toothpaste. I fell in love again.

I still caught a glimpse of your frozen face from time to time in the midst of interchanging bills for receipts, but everytime, my brain registered you differently, as if you were aging. As if the changes in me, were directly correlated to the changes in you.

Time heals all wounds. Even the ones you nurture.

I kept you in my wallet until your eyes became just eyes. No promise. No caress. Until your smile became a curve and not a secret. Until I could no longer hear your laugh. I kept a photo of you in my wallet until I stopped believing you would blink. Until I forgot about the wrinkles in your suit. Until the waves in your hair lost their salt. I kept a photo of you in my wallet until I stopped wishing on your eyelashes. Until you looked more like a stranger than a lover. More like a portrait than a friend. More like a memory, that was never mine to begin with.

And on the day, when I could no longer recognize your face, on the day when I struggled to remember your name, I took the photo, lovingly, between my index and thumb, opened my speeding car window, and let it go.