Graceless

Photo by Emmanuel Rosario

I need to write to you. I need to tell you how much you hurt me, even though you already know. Even though you enjoy it. You’re such a big part of my life, in many ways you define me. But I need to carve you out.

You’re an addictive sort of poison – you burn. It’s almost sadistic this fascination I have with you.  You attract pain, you seek it out, and sometimes I think you revel in your pity. Time and again I lift you out of your loathsome pit to incredible places, but they’re just greater heights for you to fall from. Some place higher to hit the ground harder. I suppose I don’t realise I’ve taken you too high until we’re looking down. I worry one day I won’t be able to pick you back up.

We’re close you and I, and I fool myself into thinking you care for me as much as I do for you. I think you just rely on me. I’ve seen you destroy relationships because of your relentless pedantry, anxiety and shame. I apologise for dragging you into situations that you don’t feel comfortable with, and making friends with people you can’t keep up with. I’ve seen how nervous you can get, how scared you are. People think you’re just awkward but I know you far better. But you refuse to change, you’re sabotaging your life and it hurts to watch. I used to sympathise with you but now I just resent you.

Nobody else thinks like you, nobody obsesses so much about themselves and what others think of them. Not everything has to be a wonderful love story or a tragic heartbreak. Not everything about your life has to have fantastic meaning. Sometimes life is just a cliché and you don’t have to exist beyond that.

I know you don’t listen to other people, you’re too busy in your own world crumbling under the weight of imaginary criticisms. Too busy listening to your own twisted thoughts, as they tear away at you over and over – it must be deafening. You don’t hear your friends when they tell you’ve gone too far, or that you’re ill, or that you’ve done something terrible. You wait until I tell you, but you call me far too late.

But I’m sick of looking after you. I’m sick of seeing you on the brink of destruction. You can’t quit the habit, just like I can’t quit you.  I’ve sat by as you threw everything you had to the flames, and I got burned for being too close. The truth is I’m terrified of you. I’m terrified.

So I need you to stop it. I need you to go. You’re a leech, sucking the life out of me. I’m afraid you’ll wear me away and I’ll end up like you. I don’t want to be like you. You’re a monstrous creature and a burden. I don’t want to know you anymore, I don’t want to come down to scrape you off the floor again. I don’t want to see your face again, so I’m always looking up. You can let yourself burn, but I’ll be fireproof. I’ll lose the graceless part of me and live without you.

If only I could beat you.

If only you weren’t me.