Since the first day you reached out to me, I kept searching for hints of the relationship you kept from me. I couldn’t see it in the description of your morning routine or your weekend recaps, but I could feel it in your absent admission to the contrary. I planned to keep quiet and let this fade out, as I do with everything else I feel isn’t worth fighting for. But this was you. And to me, you have always been worth it. So I finally got up the nerve to say,

Are you seeing anyone?

I knew the answer before I even asked the question. I should have asked you this in the beginning, but I convinced myself that you wouldn’t hide something like that from me. Except you did. And while you justified it by not doing anything more than correspond back and forth, the line was already crossed when you first contacted me, and you’ve been on the other side of it ever since.

At least I know that you didn’t just dismiss me as some reckless fling you had when we were younger. I can’t be mad at you for wanting to talk to me, but what was the point of this, other than resurrecting all these memories I haven’t thought about in years? It’s like you just came back to remind me that you still can’t do this. Even if you didn’t know what you were looking to get out of this in the beginning, you made the choice not to tell me about her for months. What did you want from me?

You and I will always have some unfinished business, but eventually, it’ll be as it was. You’ll forget about me. I’ll forget about you.

You’ve been out of my life for years, but somehow your absence is more tangible now than it ever was. How can I miss something I never had?

Well, I’d say I’ve successfully fulfilled my nostalgia quota for the week year.

This trip down memory lane ended at my old friend/ex-love’s 30th birthday party last night. It’s strange to see someone you’ve spent so much of your life with and feel nothing… And to think of someone else you didn’t spend nearly enough time with and feel everything.

(image via thewordsalloverme)

(image via the beholder)

Yesterday, there was an unexpected venti iced sugar-free vanilla soy latte waiting for me at my desk when I got to work in the morning. Christine treated me out to pizza and beer at Pizza Port for dinner. And then I ended the night at an amazing $10 Temper Trap show with my girls.

Today was nothing like yesterday.

(image via thresca)

He’ll never learn, cabrona. But then again, neither will you…

(image via sberon)

I waited for you in the rain last night, and the only thing I wanted to do more than turn around and go home was see you. I don’t know what makes me more sad—the fact that you haven’t apologized, or knowing that you wouldn’t.

And it wears me out
It wears me out

(image via vivatregina)

We all fall for them. Pricks are spontaneous, unpredictable and fun—and then we’re surprised when they turn out to be pricks.

Cinematic Orchestra – To Build A Home
[audio:http://www.mayanrocks.com/blog/tobuildahome.mp3]

‘Cause I built a home for you, for me
Until it disappeared from me, from you

(image via weheartit)

(image via Le Love)

John Legend – “Everybody Knows”
[audio:http://www.mayanrocks.com/audio/everybodyknows.mp3]

And I hope one day you’ll see nobody has it easy
I still can’t believe you found somebody new
But I wish you the best… I guess

(image via lovebot)

Lykke Li – “Possibility”
[audio:http://www.mayanrocks.com/blog/possibility.mp3]

So tell me when you hear my heart stop
You’re the only who knows
Tell me when you hear my silence
There’s a possibility I wouldn’t know

I regret the way pain has taught me nothing.

He told me I needed a car wash. My car was always filthy back when we were dating, and I knew he was going to say something when he saw it today. I smiled because I still knew him, but it made me sad that he hadn’t changed. Neither have I, apparently. He hugged me goodbye and held me longer than he should have. Then he left.

He sent me a message a couple weeks ago saying that “we should talk sometime.” I reasoned he was just thinking about me because it was Halloween. We spent Halloween together last year, and he had just seen his niece whose costume I had sewn. Maybe he was lonely that day. He always does this. He says “we should talk,” but I know that he won’t call. And I won’t call. He’s the one who left me. And I never chase. So where does that leave us?

(image via weheartit)

I realized today that I will never escape him. I met up with the BFF at her aunt’s house to go to dinner for her son’s birthday. I knew that Il Postino would be at work, so I wasn’t worried about running into him. But that’s all I seemed to do… without him even being there. With an extra kid in the BFF’s car, I ended up riding with Il Postino’s mom. His little sisters were supposed to be there, but they were running late as usual, so we had to go pick them up at the house. His old house. It was just me and his mom on the car ride there. She talked about him the whole time, saying how worried she was about him and that she didn’t know or trust his new friends. She said that she loved when he was dating me, because she trusted me and knew I was a good person. She apologized for going on and on (and on and on) about him. I mostly stayed quiet during the car ride. I hadn’t stepped foot in that house since I was with him almost a year ago. His grandpa told me that he missed my cupcakes. His sister was excited to show me her Halloween costume. We eventually made our way to the Spaghetti Factory for dinner. The BFF prefers the one in North County over the closer one downtown, so it was a long drive up. Time moved even slower with every mention of his name. I felt like I was in that car forever. During dinner, Il Postino’s sister said that he texted her that he was off work and waiting at their aunt’s house where we were going afterwards for birthday cake. I raised the second margarita I was on and told the BFF that I was going to need more of these if I was going to see him, half joking, but not really. When we got back to her aunt’s house, I saw his car parked outside and decided not to go up. As much as I love birthday cake, I wasn’t in the mood to deal with the awkward situation waiting for me upstairs in that tiny apartment. Not today anyway. I will always be friends with my BFF and Il Postino will always be her brother. I’ll have to figure out how to deal with that someday.

How do I slow down?
I can’t relate to my heart now
I’ve thrown what I’ve known
Is enough of me out?
I’m running on empty
I’ve gotta find some way
To fumble right through this new heartache
It’s torn me apart
Oh, lovesick mistake
Turn me away

I went to see Erin McCarley at Soma last night with Chel and Shi. I think she is so amazingly talented and underrated. She reminds me of one of my favorite Stella Im Hultberg paintings, Until the Day—beautiful, but painfully sad.

Sara Bareilles – “Gravity”
[audio:http://www.mayanrocks.com/blog/gravity.mp3]

Something always brings me back to you
It never takes too long
No matter what I say or do
I still feel you here ’til the moment I’m gone
You hold me without touch
You keep me without chains
I never wanted anything so much
Than to drown in your love and not feel your rain

I understand feeling as small and as insignificant as humanly possible. And how it can actually ache in places you didn’t know you had inside you. And it doesn’t matter how many new haircuts you get, or gyms you join, or how many glasses of chardonnay you drink with your girlfriends… you still go to bed every night going over every detail and wonder what you did wrong or how you could have misunderstood. And how in the hell for that brief moment you could think that you were that happy. And sometimes you can even convince yourself that he’ll see the light and show up at your door. And after all that, however long all that may be, you’ll go somewhere new. And you’ll meet people who make you feel worthwhile again. And little pieces of your soul will finally come back. And all that fuzzy stuff, those years of your life that you wasted, that will eventually begin to fade.

Sometimes, it’s easier to say that you’re fine instead of having to explain all the reasons why you’re not.

Do you know the most surprising thing about heartache? It doesn’t actually kill you. Like a bullet to the heart, or a head-on car wreck, it should. When someone you’ve promised to cherish forever says, “I never loved you,” it should kill you instantly. You shouldn’t have to wake up day after day after that, trying to understand how in the world you didn’t know.

I gave his jacket back today. I thought about keeping it at first…. but how many times do we need to go through this before he realizes that this isn’t what he wants? That I’m not what he wants? I can’t fight for him anymore.

I remember the night he gave it to me. I was at his house watching movies with him and his family when it started to rain. I sat and watched him from the couch while he looked for a jacket for me to wear out. He walked me down to my car and was kissing me in the rain when he said, “I feel like we’re in a movie.” I started taking off his jacket to give it back to him, and he told me to keep it. Every time someone would ask me about the air force jacket in the backseat of my car, I smiled to myself remembering that night and what he said to me.

I just can’t look at it anymore.

Have you ever been in love? Horrible isn’t it? It makes you so vulnerable. It opens your chest and it opens up your heart and it means that someone can get inside you and mess you up. You build up all these defenses, you build up a whole suit of armor, so that nothing can hurt you, then one stupid person, no different from any other stupid person, wanders into your stupid life…You give them a piece of you. They didn’t ask for it. They did something dumb one day, like kiss you or smile at you, and then your life isn’t your own anymore. Love takes hostages. It gets inside you. It eats you out and leaves you crying in the darkness, so simple a phrase like ”Maybe we should be just friends” turns into a glass splinter working its way into your heart. It hurts. Not just in the imagination. Not just in the mind. It’s a soul-hurt, a real gets-inside-you-and-rips-you-apart pain. I hate love.

– Neil Gaiman

Last night, I heard his name and the word “girlfriend” in the same sentence.

We’ve always been on again, off again, on again, off again… I guess I just figured that somewhere down the road we would be on again. Again.

He turned around and looked right at me and said nothing, not even hi. It was as if the months we had spent together, the times I spent loving him just weren’t important, as if they never happened.

I didn’t expect to see him today. I sat there on the couch as he stood in the doorway in his military uniform, just waiting. He was there to pick up his belt that he had left there the night we had both slept over. He didn’t say a word to me, but his silence spoke volumes.