Page 119 of Shhh…It’s A Killer Story

"They don't."

"They would if they could."

"He couldn't."

I laughed. Just once. It came out sounding more like another sob. Frank looked toward the floor.

"He didn't even take the box."

Gerald stopped pacing.

"No."

"He didn't."

The silence that followed hurt worse than anything either of them had said. Rejection is strange. People always compare heartbreak to knives. I don't. Knives are honest. They cut. They bleed. Eventually they heal. Rejection is different.

It's someone looking directly at the softest part of you...and deciding they don't want it.

Some of you already know that feeling. Maybe someone chose somebody else. Maybe they stopped calling. Maybe they walked away while you stood there wondering which version of yourself would've been enough to make them stay.

I'm sorry.

Truly.

I wish I could tell you there's a sentence that fixes it. There isn't. And if you've never felt it… I hope you never do. Because someday someone might hand your heart back to you as though it never belonged to them in the first place.

When that happens...

I’ll be here…

I climbed the stairs without remembering doing it. The bedroom waited exactly as I'd left it. Moonlight spilled across the wardrobe. The corkboard. The photographs. His face.

I stood there for a long time. My fingers reached toward the newest photograph almost on their own. I wrapped them around the corner. Pulled. Nothing. Again. Nothing.

Come on. Rip it.

He doesn't deserve to stay.

Rip it.

My hand trembled harder but it wouldn't move. It was only paper. Why did it feel like tearing out one of my own ribs? My strength quietly abandoned me. I slid down the wardrobe until I was sitting on the cold wooden floor, my knees tucked against my chest.

The photographs stared back. His photograph stared back. Downstairs… The cookies were probably still warm. Still waiting for someone who didn't want them. I suddenly knew exactly how they felt.

I rested my head carefully against the wardrobe door. Not against the photographs. Never against the photographs. Just...

Close enough.

For a long time, I listened to nothing. Then, so quietly even I almost didn't hear it… I asked the question I'd spent my whole life pretending I didn't carry.

"Why am I never enough?"

The room didn't answer.

Rooms never do. They simply remember every question they've ever been asked and somewhere deep inside me… A frightened little girl waited for someone to finally tell her she was worth staying for.

Seraphina