Rejection and freedom

I don't remember how the fight started. And today it doesn't matter besides that it was him who made me this way... and it was one of the last.

I wonder if I'll look back a month or two after my clothes are escaping the crowded space they used to live for less congestion on the other side and different men who'd be sexier if they didn't speak find a home in my bed, and think about this moment...

sitting in the dark, neurons zipping around my head, knocking into my skull, on the verge of exploding in a gooey mess out the left side matting my hair as if I had held a gun to the right side and pulled the trigger. I kept hearing the Avett Brothers swoon, "If you're loved by someone, you'll never reject it."

But they're wrong. Sometimes this love must be denied.

Whether it's for my sanity or... well I guess it's just my sanity.

He had just told me he loved me and wanted to be good to me and was sorry and hurt and messed up and changed.

I asked him to be left alone for a minute. He appeased.

I grabbed my phone, slid my finger across the screen, tapped the vintage-looking camera icon -- all without much thought -- and felt sick with regret.

There was the word.

"Free."

Silhouetted birds flying above it.

I didn't double tap. I didn't like it.

And it was the hardest decision I've had to make to date. Because I love...

And I don't believe in signs but...