Ruptured

                                                 RUPTURED

We met while we were both still very young, I would say about 11 years old, but the moment I saw her I knew she would be in my life till the day I died. Very dramatic, I know, but I wasn't wrong.

On that first day that I saw her, I remember just staring at her, she was beautiful and confident, unlike anyone I had met in my brief existence. At that age, I didn't fully realise the impact that she would have on me, my world, my future.

A friendship was born that day, an automatic click. We spent every moment together, well every moment that we were allowed to spend together. She was the first person I looked for when I got to school, the first one that I would tell all my exciting news to, or complain about my parents or siblings to. You see, being the only girl child, I was constantly looking for someone who truly understood me.

Our younger years together were simple, we played, we gossiped, we laughed and we cried. One thing that stood out to me in those early years is that even then, I could not take my eyes off of her. I was constantly aware of her. When she moved, my universe seemed to shift with her.

She was light-hearted, easy go lucky with a smile so big that it warmed the coldest of hearts. It is hard to explain the influence that one person can have on another. It seemed that everything we did was linked and my destiny was with her.

That didn't change when we reached High School, however it just became more complicated. You see, I had always known that I loved her, I wasn't sure that there was any room in my life for anyone else. I had given her the power to shift my universe at her will. And I was happy with that, I was happy to watch her for the rest of my life, I loved her. However, she had other plans.

High School was nothing short of dramatic. She constantly had boy troubles and she often found it difficult to find her place in the world. I kept living my life, had a boyfriend or two but I was happy.   We kept our connection and we were always there for each other. I think for me though, knowing that I loved her so deeply was enough for me to know that my place in the world was just being near to her, my place was being the person she needed me to be. It was an unspoken love though, up until a breaking point in our lives.

After high school, we were forced to go our separate ways. She went off to university on the other side of the country and I stayed in our home town. It was not easy being so far away from each other and there was a definite gap in my life with her gone.

There are 4 days in my life that are branded into my memory. The first was the first day we met when we were 11 years old, the second is the day she returned home from university, one year after leaving.

She begged me to change my plans for that evening and go out with her, I could sense that she needed me, she was in trouble again. We headed to a local coffee shop down the road, a quiet place, where we could chat without interruption. After the general catch up, her eyes started tearing up, a sight that breaks my heart. I took her hand and asked her what was wrong, she explained that she had always known that she didn't quite understand her place in the world and that she had often made mistakes. One mistake she had made, she couldn't take back, she was pregnant.

Only God knows why I thought that this was my perfect opportunity to voice my feelings, to share the depth of love and devotion that I felt for her, but I did. I rambled on about her smile, my constant awareness of her and my belief that we were and always have been on the same path in life. I thought that she would have pushed me away at this point, but she pulled me closer and I kissed her. A day I will never forget.

Finally, I felt like everything in my life had aligned. She admitted to feeling the same way about me and after we proclaimed our love for each other, we began to live, side by side. Every day I woke up and looked for her, every day I was aware of her, she would move, my universe would shift. This was not an easy process, life would never be the same for either of us. Some friends and some family members did not understand our choices, but we made it through and we have managed to raise a family together for the last 8 years.

The third day in my life that I will never forget was not as happy as the previous two. Life has its way of turning the everyday into very mundane routines and with a family, your own wants and needs often get side lined. I went through life content though, more than content I would say. From the age of 11, I knew what I wanted and was fortunate enough to have it.

She was not like me though, she has always been very restless and unsatisfied. And the restlessness seemed to have taken its toll on her. The day that I will never forget, was the day I realised that we would have to part ways again.

I woke up that morning and she was curled up next to me, the safest of places. I could hear our son making himself breakfast, it raining outside and our day was about to begin. I drew her closer to me and kissed her neck gently, it was the perfect setting for us to rekindle and take a bit of the mundane out of our day. She turned to face me with a look that I have never seen before, she was distant and uninterested, I was hurt and remember her mumbling an excuse and she got out of bed.

With one looked she had moved and she took my universe with her. For the rest of the day I contemplated all the reasons that she was so distant and I schemed as to how I would pull her closer again. I arranged for our son to stay at a friend's house that night so that we could have some much needed alone time.

When she got home, we sat and had dinner together. Once we were on our second bottle of wine, we moved over to the couch and her eyes started to tear up again. With my heart breaking I tried to take her hand again, but this time she pulled it away and I was forced to ask her what was wrong. Again, she felt that she was not sure about her place in life but assured me that she loved me, however she feels that this has been the biggest mistake of her life. She claimed that she needed to be alone and follow her own dreams, she claimed that she has had people help her run her life for as long as she could remember and she needed to become independent.

This was all I can remember from that night, I think that I went into a state of shock. She did not want what I had to offer, what I had always given to her, my love, my devotion. I left the house that night knowing that I would no longer be able to watch her, feel her move and feel the warmth of her smile.

I spent two weeks in a complete daze, I had spent my life devoted to one person and I felt completely lost. I had also started to feel ill over this time, I thought that it was because of the depression I was going through, however I decided to go to the doctor. The doctor was unsure what my symptoms were pointing to, so he decided to run some tests. A week later I was called back into the doctors rooms. This would be the fourth day that is branded into my memory. I was diagnosed with Lung Cancer and was given 4 - 6 months to live.

                                                 .....................................

We met when we were pretty young, around ten or eleven years old. It's a day I will never forget because I met a person that I will never forget, a person I will always love. No one believes me when I tell them that I have met the person that I was meant to be with and she swore she would love me till the day she died and she did.

We grew up together, we went through it all. She was my rock, my constant and I always knew she was close to me, no matter how far apart we were.

I have to confess though that I was not an easy person to be around, I constantly felt troubled, as if I was unsure where I belonged. Even after we had been married and had a son together, even lying in her arms every night, I constantly felt restless, I felt that even though I had given myself to her, I had not done so completely.

There were 4 days in her life that she claimed she would never forget, she didn't live long after that fourth day. I lived through each of those days with her but I am unfortunate enough to add a fifth day to that list, the day I buried her.

I buried her knowing that she promised to love me till the day she died, I buried her knowing that I betrayed that love, I betrayed her devotion and my greatest act of cowardice was that I never told her the truth, I was never brave enough to give myself completely.

"Awareness requires a rupture with the world we take for granted..."

-Shoshana Zuboff