Cotton Candy Hues

I’ll break the barriers and I’ll tear down those walls.
Because no longer can I allow myself to be bound by what you may or may not think.
And no longer can I care about the way you see or do not see me.


I’m tired of the way the world judges.
And knowing that what you think cannot hurt me is the most liberated I’ve ever felt.

In the course of knowing you, I found myself, lost all of it and more, and then went on to gain the single, most important experience in my life. The first time we talked, never did it occur to me then that you marked the end of my childhood and the start of the rest of my life.

Here we are again. The way we’ve always been. Seated in a haphazard circle as conversation makes its way around like the cigarette that is currently being passed back and forth over the glasses of wine. Remember how topics of conversation revolved around the next exam paper, the class bitch, or the teacher with the frumpiest dress? How we used to squeal with laughter over that oversized purple dress with the equally oversized white polka dots the size of CDs. Can you see the way I do how the conversation has evolved through the years? A subtle but sure sign that we are all changing, that we have changed, that maybe our adolescence is slowly but surely being chipped away one scrape of the heart at a time. These days, no longer do we talk about exams or the class bitch (Lord knows where she ended up), or even the mismatched curtain print dresses the teachers seem so partial to. Instead, we talk about things like boys and living on your own, sex and self-harm, internships and affairs, pregnancy and choices, being gay and what it means to love. We look in each other’s eyes and we see the hollow that comes from the pain we have yet to learn how to deal with, the uncertainty of being presented with the choice between what we want and what we must do, and the bewilderment at finding out that the world is not black and white the way we were always taught but instead, an unsettling shade of grey. We see each of us standing at the very edge of the cusp that will throw us into something we’re not sure we’re ready for - the journey to becoming the people we are set to become for the rest of our lives. But for every new phase that comes our way, we always find ourselves back here. Seated in this haphazard circle. And at the end of the day, nothing says ‘warmth’ better than knowing we can look at each other and still giggle at ourselves amidst all the craziness of growing older and learning to be the person that each of us are meant to be. And so you must know that this, you, are what I am thankful for. That I can look at you, us, and know I couldn’t have had it better.

Sometimes I think part of the reason why I never wanted to let go is because I needed to prove how much this meant to me. How much you meant to me. As if my love for you was quantifiable by the amount of time I spent not letting go. You said it yourself, that there was nothing else I could do. There was nothing else you could do. How else could I prove the way I felt to you and I both? How else could I prove the depth of how I felt, even if you could never feel the same? So I held on. As if my love for you could be measured by the amount of tears I cried, the amount of blood I let flow, the number of times my heart twisted and tore at its seams, the number of nights I stayed awake knotted up in ball, and the number of times I held my breath when breathing became too painful. Did you know? Did you see? Did you realize how I would have gone to the ends of the earth for you, even if you didn’t want me to? Sometimes I wonder if at the end of the day my love became a burden for you. A weight you had to carry around, hiding it beneath the folds of your skin. Like a lie that mustn’t be seen. Molding you, forcing you to be someone you’re not. In my effort to hold on and prove to you just how much I loved you, did I unintentionally make life that much harder for you? So that with every step you took, you turned sideways, hiding the truth, sugaring it. Was it like that for you? All I wanted was for you to know just how far and deep this stretched for me. Because you always seemed so eager to brush it aside as something lesser than what it was. But for all your willingness to downplay everything, could you fool yourself into believing that I was engaged in nothing but child’s play? Did you see it? Did you see me standing on the edge of all that I have ever known, ready to give up the world for you? Did you fight so hard to pretend it wasn’t so because it scared you? People always talk about how scary it is to love someone, but is it scarier to be loved by someone you cannot love back? Did it scare you to be loved so hard by someone you could never love back? Was it wrong for me to hold on and in doing so, probably made life harder for you? Maybe. I could apologize for being that weight you had to carry around, but then again, maybe loving you is the only thing I will not apologize for.

I told myself that if anything, out of this, I will learn how to truly love. That if there was one thing I was going to take with me besides the pain and hurt and blood, it was going to be that I will learn how to love without expectations, without asking for love in return, without conditions.

When you said, “I’ve found my happiness”, I repeated that phrase over and over again in my head for days. And each time, my heart ached and my chest constricted and my breath caught. Each time, I felt the sweet rush of your joy, the warmth of what you now call home, the overflowing triumph of one part of yourself complete, and the crushing, paralyzing weight of my realization that I couldn’t be the one to complete you. And never did I realize it was possible to feel so much all at once for another person and for yourself. To be both so happy and yet so sad at the same time.

I told myself I would learn to love unconditionally. To learn how to love right. Which is why now I cannot decide if it’s okay for me to feel this sad even if at the same time, I am so happy and proud of you and for you.

If only you knew how much I fight everyday not just for myself, so I can move on, but also to give you what I think you deserve from the world - the correct sort of love. If there is ever such a thing.