Collateral Damage

What didn’t die from being deleted, I killed.. It means nothing. It does nothing. I don’t give a damn.

In the words of Anaheeta, funnily enough, neither do I. My fingers type out responses of their own accord, rhythmically clicking on the send button. I don’t know who I’m writing to or what and I don’t care really. But it’s important to go through the motions. To pretend that everything is ok. There is no choice but to be ok. I did what I had to do. Now it’s his turn and he does do it so much better. I think about what Usha said as we cried together. What goes around comes around. What I took from her, I lost here. The wetness on my face surprises me. I didn’t think I had any tears left to cry. For a woman who doesn’t have many close friends, I’m doing a bang up job of losing the ones I do. Am I incompetent or just utterly stupid? Or am I emotionally and morally stunted without Aashish to anchor me in place? At least now I know why I’ve never had a boyfriend. I don’t know how.

I tap out a text and hit send. But I need an answer now. I type out an email, but natural, T-Mobile has different plans, and keeps returning an error. The third effort pushes me over the edge, and I let the panic attack overtake me, fighting it long enough to punch another urgent text. He’s home and answers, but all I can do is cry. Several minutes and soothing noises later, my breathing stops hitching, long enough to string a few words together. I’m scared. Scared of not having you in my life. Of losing those I love. Of being alone. Of not being able to be with someone. What’s wrong with me? It takes thirty minutes before I calm down enough for us to talk without my voice breaking, nose running or animal wails slipping through. I haven’t been able to get it right since we split. Four years. Three friends. Another ten minutes before I can share a wobbly laugh about my intensity scaring everyone off.

Being told it was inevitable doesn’t ease the starkness of the loss. It was always too complicated, there was never going back after the first moment, the collateral damage, predictable. To take an existing friendship somewhere else is hard to begin with, but to attempt it under duress is begging for failure. I can see that, but I can’t understand how he can retain the equanimity, when it’s killing me. He’s used to losing people he loves, and makes no distinction between where you still have a choice and where you have none. I remember when it ended with Rajesh, I wished him dead, because that would have been easier to deal with, more complete. But I was 24 then. To lose those you love so completely shatters your world. It’s hard to pick up the pieces and carry on, because they were the ones that helped you glue them back together the last time.

He lets me talk. But is unsurprised. I try to muster irritation for his having predicting it, but I’m just too tired, beaten. He knows me like no one does. He is my soulmate. We just can’t be together. A recurring motif as it turns out. This time, my mate, yet not mine. To acknowledge loss is one thing, but to have to deal with the rawness of losing it so completely is devastating. Maybe the box isn’t such a bad idea. He says it’s not my fault, that it was always too tenuous to sustain. Perhaps. All I know is that right now, I don’t want to be alone. I want to matter to someone. To be the most important thing in their life. To be loved, always. Apparently I am to a number of people. Interesting then, isn’t it to be up at 12.30 sobbing into the duvet. I know there are those things that just aren’t meant to be. But the friendships that you had once, those that mattered most to you, they were always meant to be.

My head throbs, my eyeballs ache, and my vision blurs. I’m emotionally spent, physically exhausted, spiritually bankrupt. Do I feel better? The gentle question makes me feel worse, and I feel my eyes well in response. I feel as fragile as spun sugar, but it’s gone 1 am, and he needs to sleep. As do I. Maybe tomorrow.