Your Bullshit Goodbye

Goodbye…

You said ‘Goodbye’ and you ‘broke my heart’, or so you say.

Truth is, you wouldn’t know what saying goodbye was all about at all.

To say goodbye would mean you had to speak words, tell me your feelings and walk away. You didn’t do that though.

You didn’t know how.

You talk about saying goodbye to me like you’re the only person in the world who knows what really happened. You don’t tell anyone the truth, not really.

You tell it how you want it to seem.

That way, you don’t come across like the bad guy. Like the person who broke someone’s heart. Like the person who had been pushed and pushed until they had nowhere to go but away.

That’s bullshit and you know it.

It’s your bullshit goodbye.

You never tell people how you just snapped one day and never said goodbye. You don’t tell them about how you left without a reason or cause, you just did. Why don’t you mention that?

Tell us all.

Why don’t you mention that?

If I wasn’t good enough, why did you lie to me? If I was, why did you leave? You can’t simply tell someone they did nothing wrong and that they were everything you needed and more. It doesn’t work that way.

It doesn’t.

The only people who do that are cowards. But I guess that’s your true colours, isn’t it?

Truth is, I know the real story.

I know how you left and you didn’t tell me why. You didn’t tell me to my face, or act like the adult you are. I know how you hid behind your mother and acted like a petulant child. I get it.

What I always wonder is how did you tell your friends and family it happened? Did you tell them I cheated? Or that I betrayed your trust? Did you tell them lies about how my heart was with another, or that I hurt you so bad you couldn’t stay?

What lies did you stick to my name?

Because if my name is going to be stuck with your lies, then your name is going to be branded with my truths. The truths you didn’t dare share with anyone.

I wasn’t perfect, that much is obvious. I won’t ever try and say I was, or that I wasn’t at fault. Because I obviously was part of the problem.

I was angry, I carried that anger with me all the time. But I never directed that at you.

Not once.

Not ever.

Not even now.

The anger I carried was aimed at another. My former. Not my future.

And I never truly told you why I was angry but now I will. Not because you deserve it, but, because I do. I deserve to get this out now.

My former hurt me, in a way that was entirely not her fault.

She left for a month, my love entrusted with another who I begged to protect her. He did not. He let her get taken advantage of. Raped. I never spoke about what happened to her because I never felt it was right to share that then. I need this now though.

A man hurt my former and I was never there to look after her. To stop it. To stop him. And she struggled with the guilt of what happened. Lost between worlds where she wasn’t raped, the fairytale her family pushed on her impressionable mind, she had just had a crazy night out and had a one night stand. That was one of many straws that broke me.

For months, even more so after she left, I dealt with that guilt and anger. It consumed me, and only now, all this time on, I am starting to move past it.

But it isn’t easy.

Not at all.

I wore the words of her family for months. How I wasn’t good enough for her. How I was a waste of her time. Countless nasty things were said about me and then she started to believe them too. She started to let them consume her. All while I carried my guilt, she stabbed me in the back and begun to twist the knife.

She left and I broke.

Then you started to put me back together again.

But I never lost that guilt. That pain. That anger.

I wanted to desperately to tell her where she could go. For the hurt, the anger, for everything. I wanted to tell her and her family just how nasty and worthless they were. It was almost all I wanted to do. It consumed me like they had consumed her.

So when we got further and further into our love, I still had it with me. This horrible pain. This pure anger which consumed me.

And I was too scared of hurting you to deal with it.

So it got worse.

And worse.

And worse.

Until you snapped, and you left too.

With your bullshit goodbye.

But that’s the part I can’t forgive. Your bullshit reply.

When people ask you what I did, what do you say? Do you have a story in your mind, one you carry everywhere? One where I cheat or hurt you, or abuse you, or something awful? One that drags my name through the mud?

Do you tell people something new every time until something sticks?

Or do you merely ignore the question all together?

I know my name might be mud now, and that’s okay with me. You can do whatever you like with it because it’s still mine. And I’ll wear it with pride. But tell me, do you ever tell people the actual truth?

The truth that comes in 140 characters or less?

The truth that came in a text message you sent impulsively before ignoring all my calls and texts?

The truth that nearly killed me?

When you write about leaving, and hurting people, and what I did in our relationship, and all the other shit you’re going to write about me, or say about me…

When you write your poems,

Of all your bullshit goodbyes…

Don’t forget to keep it in 140 characters…

Or less…