It's The Kindest Thing, Isn't It?

I fumble foolishly with the moth bitten hole in my woolen jumper, fingering the threads as I build up the confidence to look at him.

I feel his worried eyes burning into my head, longing for me to break the silence that I have cast.

“I’m sorry, I’ve made up my mind.” My last words echo around his bedroom, spinning around us like the worlds worst roundabout. I can no longer work out whether the tears dripping onto my hands are his or mine.

Him and I. We’re one of the same, always have been. It’s funny what a four year relationship can do to you. 

“Please Soph, you’ve said this before,” the lump in his throat takes over and he lets out a sob, “I’ll change, I can change Soph,” he grips my soaked hand tighter, “please baby.”

Whilst my brain re-plays the memory of our first date together, where he was so nervous he kept on stumbling over his words and I, unsure whether he was right for me. Then we kissed and I felt all I was supposed to feel. He put melodies back into my life that night. He is the greatest man I have known, which is why I shake my head as I look up into his eyes and tell him no.

I watch as his eyes flood with disbelief, his dark irises drowning in his tears. I pull the hand that’s sitting under his grip and reach up to his cheek. He rests into it, his stubble brushing against me. I savour the feeling, the comfort of him. 

The beauty of him I am giving him away to a world I do not exist in. 

She will listen to his heartbeat as she lies her head atop his chest, she will feel the patterns that his fingers trace against against the skin of his back, she will initially find it itchy, the feel of his beard against her lips as they kiss, then she will eventually find it to be the most comforting feeling in the world. She will shout and so will he, until he caves and apologises even without meaning it, just so he can hold her, for to him, an embrace with her is worth its weight in gold.

He doesn’t want this, and neither do I, but I am a coward. I unbuttoned the trousers of another, I let lips that weren’t his kiss me. All over. I enjoyed it, I yearned for it. I called out the name of his friend whilst I climaxed and I trembled beneath his body as he then called out mine with one final thrust.

Instead of telling my baby this, I’m leaving him. I’m not a good person, I’m aware of this. The best I can do is set him free without visions of me and someone else embraced together. Let alone that someone else being the one he will undoubtedly go to first after this conversation has ended.