The coping chronicles - Part V

What matters...

In the end all that mattered was not giddy happiness

The thousands of memories that we made
That makes me remember you
When I bite guiltily into a custard-filled doughnut
When I look at my wallet while filling gas
When I look at her face and see you

And then I feel the tingling in my eyes
The heaviness that makes me so tired, so exhausted
And suddenly leaves me speechless
My mind full of questions jostling with bitterness

In the end that is not what made me take the next step
Or the fact that I wanted to avoid familiar faces and voices
(because I did not want to share anything)
Or that I realized that I wanted out permanently
Out of this world
And was held back only by the vision of her
Standing on the top of the stairs, telling me not to go

In the end, that scared me
That I was so close to giving up
That I was so tired, yet again
That maybe it would not matter to her in a few more years
The harm would have been done

When I look at her
With her head full of princesses and happy endings
The way she tunes us out during meals
Watching cartoon episodes that she knows end to end
And refusing to see anything new
I wonder if it is because that is one familiar thing
That gives her stability
That warm, happy, assured feeling
In the end, that is what I wanted too.


When she prattles on
Sometimes making sense as a toddler
Sometimes making sense as an adult
Sometimes not making sense at all, because I was somewhere else
Sometimes not making sense, because she was not trying to
Because all that she wanted was to take me away from that moment
In the end that was what I wanted to do for her

In the end I wanted to lead that little girl
With her dreams of princesses
With her stubborn insistence on happiness
And her love of everything bright, happy and make-believe
Away from these moments
Away from this world that we had created for ourselves
A world that we had created with love, crazy ideas and dreams
And which was now so suffocating, so full of lies, deception and hurt.
Away from the accusations

Where she would still have her parents
Maybe separate
But still with her
And it would start to feel natural


Maybe she would miss you on your side of the bed
Maybe she would ask me if we were picking you up
Maybe she would want to go shopping with you
Maybe, every time we meet, she would want us to be together again

But sometimes these things matter less
What matters less are the memories that are there
What matters more are the memories that we want to build


And I do not want to build memories of bitterness
I do not want my memory of that little girl on the staircase
To be replaced by that of a girl that has been brought down hard on reality
Or that of a girl who has made herself escape realism altogether.

In the end, that is all that matters - the memories that would be...for her.