The knowledge that they’re gone. And it’s your fault.
The understanding that they’re not just gone from you, but happy to leave. To know that your time spent together eventually became the symbol of a springboard, you; the starting blocks of a headlong sprint. Away. As fast as possible.
To know your shared memories will be dismissed like lint dusted from the shoulder of a new cardigan. Neither cherished, nor hated. Just brushed away.
You did this. You didn’t mean to, but you did.
Please come back.
Please?
But vulnerability now looks desperate. Words of love are caught and lost on the wind. Pleas are stomach aches. Apologies are handed back; too late. Too little. Too much.
This too, shall not pass, but form the quiet dust on luggage best left packed up, added to the attic pile of unresolveds and might-have-beens and goodbyes with doors left yet still ajar.
To know they’re gone, with a smile on their lips, and relief on their minds.
And to know: you did this.
Fourteen Twenty 