Here I am again on another sleepless night in a bed that feels as though it is 3 sizes too big. I lay staring blankly at the dim shadows of the fan reflecting off the ceiling while contemplating life, history, and prospects of the future. Unfortunately, I found myself reminiscing about friends new and old. I realized that over the years I had lost more friends than I had ever really gained (somehow) and seem to be at a loss for how one conducts… life. Stupidly, I found myself tumbling my way through old facebook messages thanks to the (terrible) advent of mobile phones. I soon found my way onto the chat box belonging to myself… and Talitha. As I ran my finger from the top of the screen to the bottom, searching for a good place to start, I stumbled upon one of your hundreds of “break-up” conversations. This conversation in particular saw her pleading with me for allowing this site to remain up and running therefore providing her with a written testimony for each of our excursions and the evolution of my feelings towards and about her. I scrolled thorough the messages and began to the my pattern of the decent into depression. I started off strong and slowly became more of an asshole as I was convinced that I had felt no pain and had no remorse for my actions. Looking back, of course, I know that I was a fool for saying the things I had said and with a slightly more objective mind (I am actually quite tired and therefore objectivity is kinda thrown out the window) I could see where Talitha’s confusion had lain. As I read through the messages, I felt each heart string tug once more on the familiar feelings of the past. Since so long ago, Talitha has moved on as well as I, if not for long. Talitha, from what I can tell over my occasional (stalking) check on her facebook (out of boredom and curiosity!) she appears to be in a happy committed relationship and I couldn’t be happier for her. Yet… I lie in bed for hours thinking of nothing but her. My dreams as of late are flooded with images of her face. My current actions all relate back to some semblance of her. Though for a period of time I had found another to love, and love her I did, my thoughts always return to her. I can’t be sure of why and there is no timeframe that could explain this. I barely even remember around what time Talitha and I got together and when we stopped being “together” (and on and off and on and off and… etc.).
My problem is: I am haunted forever by her memory. I felt like my love for Emily was stronger than it was with Talitha when we were together. If this is true, though, wouldn’t my break up with Emily have been more harsh? Wouldn’t I have strove to return to Emily once more after we had broken up? Of course, the notion was always there as a clear alternative, but not one I had ever acted on; Not as I did with Talitha. I see her face every time I close my eyes and in the back of my mind, all I can think is that I am the last thing on her mind. I have seen her, though, a couple times since we parted company. Once I was only about two feet away from her. She didn’t even notice me though. I must say, though, that I’m quite ok with that. I… hmm… I feel as though I fear seeing her again. I’m terrified that if I see her again, and she acknowledges me again, the pain and frustration of being with her will flood back again. There’s also the fear that she’s changed and her aversion to Asian men has receded and perhaps things would start over. The latter is a bad and a good fear, but one that I am not looking forward to play out. In the conversation that I read, I pleaded with her to forget about me and I begged her to not remember the person I was and to put me completely out of her mind when we finally stopped talking. She begged me to not delete her off of facebook. She desperately wanted me to remain a part of her life just as much as I secretly wanted the same from her. She called me an unlabelable friend, not in so many words, of course. She was always more eloquent than I was. I often wonder if she has figured out that label yet. I also wonder if she has truly forgotten about me. I wonder what she is dreaming about. I miss the days when I could spend hours talking to her about anything. The days when I would absentmindedly drop whatever I was doing just to see her, if only for a second. Still, I cannot help but pause whenever I see her and feel my heart freeze in my chest.
How is it that after all this time, after nearly two years, I can still be haunted by this one girl? Why is it that I was so in love with the one girl that I had who would never be mine? How come the girl that I did have and the girl that did want me back couldn’t stay in my life for longer than a few months? How come my Talitha still plagued my dreams even while I would lay next to Emily? Why did I expect Talitha’s face when I woke up in the morning? Why do I still dream about her? I keep telling myself that it’s been 2 years, I’ve successfully moved on and I’m officially a functioning adult. But it’s not true. It hasn’t been true for a long time. Ever since that… what? November night? Why can’t I get her out of my head from 21 months ago? Why can I still remember her voice in all the different things that she did? Every song that I hear pulls out the thought “I wish Talitha was singing this song.” Every time I hear a girl sing, why must I compare it to the angelic voice of Talitha? It can’t possibly be the fate that Talitha and I joked about. Fate is not this cruel. Am I truly destined to be trapped with this perfect image to hold against all future prospects? Am I doomed to hold Talitha in such high regard for the rest of my mortal life? Why must I feel this way about a girl who did nothing but throw me under a bus?
I always believed the term “Love Never Dies” was a term coined for the likes of Shakespeare and television, but this lingering sensation continues on in my head. I know that at one point I loved her, but is it possible that this unrequited love remains? Unrequited love is supposed to be this tainted form of love that can only be overcome by a shared, requited feeling of love. A type of love that I believe Emily and I had. Yet this sensation did not go away. It would not seem to be that mankind was designed for this kind of yearning. No man deserves to pine over a girl who does not and will never love him back. But I am that man. I am the undeserved man who continues his fawning and yearning for a love that will never come back. For a love that was never his.
I can only fear that Talitha has stayed true to her word, all those years ago when she begged me to allow her this blog. I can only fear that she truly does look back on our time together. I can only fear that she sees this post and discovers how truly broken I am after our last “encounter” be it ever so brief. My time of moving on has since past and I am left with nothing but life. As life continues on, I am trapped with this ghost flitting about my thoughts and memories, attaching itself to every object I look at and touch. This ghost haunts my memories and taints the world around me causing myself to become more cynical than the boy I once was. Makes me yearn for days past and despise the grim future that awaits me absent of Talitha. The shredded tatters of my heart still cry for a mending that will never come. Some people tell me that this is how one feels about a first love, but never have I heard anyone describe the pain to be this terrible and the nights to be this long. It doesn’t help that I’ve shared this bed with Talitha many times and woken to her perfect figure each of those times. I’ve lain in this bed with her running my fingers through her perfectly curly hair and kissing her perfect lips and forehead. I’ve entwined my fingers with hers as we would talk into the night. I would wrap my arm around her stomach and pull her into me as I would kiss her cheek. I still remember her scent as though she were still here next to me. I remember each expression she would make regarding each action I made as well as the verbal comments she would retort when I teased her. I remember her beautiful green eyes as I stared deeply into them in the silence between conversations. I remember holding her whenever we would part just to smell her hair and kiss her neck. All things that I can never have again. All things that remind me of what I knew as a perfect life… that I can never have again.
helplessromanticist 
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