Sometimes I read stories about long lost loves or people that played together as children who find each other and end up together. That is not how my long lost story unfolded. I am embarrassed to this day, I am ashamed of this thing that happened to me. I never speak of it and I have never written about it because I believe he still comes here to read my writing, I believe he thinks I write about him when I am really writing about people I have really loved. I worry that whatever I write will anger him and he will kill me. I worry he will kill himself and try to make me watch it. I don’t know exactly what his mind would do in response to my writing but I expect it would be terrible. He found me after 20+ years of not seeing each other, not knowing one single thing about each other… He found me just to hurt me. For no other reason than I popped into his mind one day, the 14 year old girl he’d meet one summer. I had lied and told him I was older, he broke up with me when he found out and said he could never be with a liar… the irony is stifling since not one word he ever said to me was true after that. It’s easy to believe in someone pining for you for so many years, it makes it easy to overlook all the red flags and the obvious dangers. Looking back, that is what embarrasses me, the oversight, but not the fairytale, that part was so inherent to me, to see the good in others, to want to feel that connection. That part will never embarrass me, though I’m sure he desperately wants it to. Making me look stupid was his driving force, the dance of deception made him so happy, feel so powerful. 

But. 

I am powerful too.

I believe I saved other women from his ire while he was so focused on me. I believe he was at a breaking point, a desperate state when I took him in and cared for him so instantly. I don’t think he expected it. I think while he tried to use it and manipulate it and find every weakness I ever had, I don’t think he expected me too keep caring for him ass long as I did. And I believe he was on the cusp of doing something terrible to anyone because he was rejected and lonely and unlovable. 

I loved the monster. 

I know he was never loved that way before and he will never be loved that way again. I gave him mercy and compassion. While it was all a rouse on his part, I was genuine and warm and exceptional in my care for him. He would laugh and say I was a sucker, the best kind, because I was so naive, but I am a good person, the kind who would show mercy and compassion again and he can never take that from me. My life will be amazing and I will have all the things he will never have, except for that brief moment in time when he tricked a kind woman into caring for him. I’ll be that person all day. The trick is, I meant it, I gave freely of myself. And still do. He will think that is hilarious, that I’m a fool. But I gave him his one time in life when someone didn’t know how truly horrible he was inside. I am proud of being that person. He can also, never take that from me. 

I remember the police officer who helped me first to file the report… He stopped and put down his papers and said… this is going to be incredibly hard now and I’m sorry for that, but you are very brave to be here and I can tell you don’t deserve any of this. 
I was brave. 

And I didn’t deserve any of it. 

And to be honest, that was all I needed to hear to get through it. And it was hard. And there are no laws that protect us from this but my kind police officer found one that would help. And he went in front of a judge over and over so I wouldn’t have to. And he called me and told me everything that happened, even though he didn’t have to. And he changed my life, restored my faith. I focused on that when I was scared. I remembered that when I was unsure. 

I also remember the 16 year old boy I knew who must have gone through some terrible things, whose mind is clearly not his own, who once I dug around…I found that he was not only alone but hated, and feared. I gave you one last moment of light. I don’t regret that. But my kindness does not extend to you anymore and it never will. 

Let’s get something straight – I will take your labels spit at me with teeth clenched – slut, whore, bitch, tease. I will take them because they don’t hurt me the way you intend them to. You want to shame me – for being a woman, for being sexual, for being just fine on my own. I understand that you don’t understand. So let me enlighten you…

I like sex. I really, really do. Intimacy is a whole other matter. But it’s MY matter. It’s my experiences and preferences and mostly my nemesis. Sex without intimacy is easy for me. It softens my edges, gives me release. I find my body can experience the pleasure if my mind is not distracted with what will happen after. You call it slutty. I call it freedom. 

I’ve tried so hard all these years to be a good girl. To be monogamous. To take the lead of the men in my life. To be virtuous. I have struggled with this all my life…not just after the men who disappointed me or abused me or simply stopped touching me. Even before that, I knew I was more fluid in how I wanted to manage relationships. Men have always, always tried to covet me. I think because I have always, always exuded a strong sense of my sexuality. I have always felt “sexy” even amongst my own body insecurities and self doubt, the voice in my head has never failed to remind me of this. And it has not made me popular, with men and women alike. It genuinely pisses people off when you feel good and work hard to just be yourself. 

If myself is slutty, should I be ashamed? Even more than that, are men allowed to shame me into relationships? Because they think they can “save” me or hold me in their space. No matter how many times I preface a meeting with “I’m not interested in a relationship”…they will press on, tell me I’ll get over it, that they’ll teach me how to love again. Sorry gentlemen, I already know how to love. I am not broken or disgusting or weak because I don’t want to enter into a black and white “you own me” relationship. When I say I just want to be friends, you try to kiss me when I leave anyways. And say, “sorry, I hope that was ok”. When I say that the sex is just sex to me and you corner me asking “why the intimacy is missing”. When I tell you I don’t love you and you insist that I will learn if I just try.

There’s a saying…when people show you who they are, believe them. 

This has always come across as a negative saying that we apply to the people who hurt us, as in, there were signs they were bad people and we didn’t heed them. It’s a saying that is often used to warn against the terrible people who are out to get you. 

I am, by this definition, a terrible person. 

I will not love you, simply because you demand it. This isn’t a Hollywood movie where if you just persist enough, we will be soul mates. Where I will realize, if you tell me enough times, that I want to live in the confines of your white picket fence. Where you can tell everyone…I tamed her. And people can feel better that there isn’t a wild woman on the loose anymore. 

I have loved. Good god, I have loved. I intend to do it again. I know, immediately my ilk…my equals. The ones who don’t want to lasso me. To define me. The best relationship I had was the one where I didn’t have to lie and neither did he. We tried to pass it off to everyone else as normal, we did. We tried not to let our blurry boundaries be apparent but eventually they were. And I scrambled to right myself into a monogamous marriage and so did he. To be acceptable and stable. And it almost killed me. Because there are far worse things lurking in the shadows of people trying to parade as normal. Give me messy and audacious any day. Give me your carnal truth and I’ll give you mine. 

I’m am not suggesting an anarchist orgy of worldwide proportions here.  I understand the need for order and partnership and stability. I desire these things too. To know who I can rest on. To be able to shelter another person. I desire that very much. Even wild women need a soft place to land. But you do not get to appoint yourself my savior because I am a woman who will not settle. 

I’ve had enough. 

Don’t tell me my words are venom because they aren’t the words you want to hear. Don’t tell me I’ve betrayed you because I did exactly what I said I would. Don’t tell me I deserve to be alone because I don’t want to be with you. I try to be kind. There are so many of you I love spending time with. I love talking to you and hearing your stories. I really do. I find myself thinking of you and trying to find a place for you.  Because I know it’s coming soon, the need to be defined. Or ultimately the need to force your definition on me. 

No. I’ve had enough. 

“Women are not machines that you put kindness coins into and sex falls out” -Sylvia Plath

You can’t sugar coat me into sex or otherwise. I give what I want to give. I’m honest and up front and I am simply done with selling myself as a used bill of goods. I am a woman who loves sex but may not love you. That does not make me broken. I may stroke your hair and your face, trace invisible letters on your back and summarize the highlights of our evening together. I want you to be happy while we’re together. I want you to feel content and joyful. Most of all, I want you to feel free. Something brought us together and I am always grateful for these connections. Sometimes they are physical. Sometimes they are not. I’m getting better at knowing who can handle crossing that line and being able to make it back on their own. But I make mistakes in these assessments sometimes. These are often the ones followed by cries of “whore” or “bitch”. I accept these labels because I know they don’t hurt me, they come as a result of your hurt, intended or not. 

When people show you who they are, believe them. 

Believe me when I say  I won’t love you. Believe me when I say that sex won’t eventually lead to a relationship or that I am truly happy on my own. Believe me. I haven’t hidden who I am for a long time now. I know it will take some people time to get used to and others who never will but I am at last, comfortable enough in this skin to feel worthy of it. 

Perhaps there is one great love out there for me. Perhaps I have already cashed in my great love ticket in this lifetime. I’ve known great love. I consider myself so lucky in that. And maybe no one else will ever compare and maybe somebody even better will come along. But just know that I know. That when I tell you, that you are not the one, that it’s not personal, that it’s not meant to hurt you. That we were meant to meet for something, however temporary, and that I am open to that, if you are. Because anything else will hurt you. And despite the many times I have been told I am a terror of hearts, I know I have only been anointed as a keeper of moments. I will not be shamed or forced into a place I don’t belong anymore. 

So, stop it. When someone loves you, you’ll know. When someone wants to be with you, you’ll know. 

Nothing else is worth our time. 

When I tell people I’m not ready to date yet….what I’m really saying is I’m not ready to stop missing you. That they will never compare. That they could have my body but they’ll never have my heart. 

I remember like it was yesterday the way you laughed while we ate Pho and had thumb wars in between, how you always cheated and said you forgot what you were doing when I looked at you with my pretty eyes. Remember that day? Remember when we had a picnic in your work van because you got called in and we couldn’t go on our hike so you came and met me in the parking lot and we ate sandwiches while you played with my hair. Remember when we ate soup in the back of my car and you fell asleep on my lap while I played with your hair…always stealing moments…always knowing the clock was ticking, that time was never on our side. 

I think too about how you hurt me, whispered in my ear that you loved me even if it made me squirm and protest. Even when I begged you to stop saying it, so you would say “arugula” instead because you said you loved saying the word as much as you loved me and that you had never loved anyone that way and knew it was poisonous for two people who didn’t know how to love to want each other so much. I tried to excuse your terrible behavior, the way you would just not show up sometimes or say the most condescending things without apology. I could see that everything that came out of you was tainted by a past without love and consideration for your needs as a boy, for the insanity of your teenage years trying to be tough, trying to control the savage part of you that seemed to win out everytime. The part that still does. The part that does not hesitate to hurt me. Even when I came to see you, so sick, and you told me to marry you and I could see the sincerity and the almost joyful look on your face that you were making me uncomfortable and weak. You looked me up and down and waited for me to break. But I waited. Until I got in the car. And I cried so long I thought I might die. And I only saw you one more time, at our favorite place, where we both knew I had hardened myself to you, that I would only ever feel in the past for you again. And when you asked me what I wanted, I said “to never see you again”. And you stood up and walked out. Yes you did. And not one man has stood in your place since that I didn’t hate for taking up that space. 

I am a terrible judge of character. That has proved itself time and time again. This last man so ridiculous that I laugh out loud at how long it took me to see it. But I always think of you, of your filthy heart and how long I had to hold it to see how lovely you were underneath. Even though I knew you would do everything in your power to destroy me, because it’s all you know and all you have ever been able to love about yourself…your power. The sheer size of you that dwarfed even me, that helped you intimidate and overshadow even the bravest of souls. Your barrel chest…oh how I miss that. Running my fingers down every rib. I loved you. You are the only man I have ever really loved. And I can’t make sense of these mere mortals who try to claim me now. And they never hear me when I say I will never love them. They won’t believe me, tell me I will love again. I can almost hearing you laughing. At me. At them. You own me. And everyone else will just slide off the slippery wet of your lips on mine…the way you would hover over my mouth and just breathe with me. Wait until I had calmed and met you in your energy. How long has it been now? But I still feel it. I still feel you. But feeling all of that means I feel all of your ugly, awful, haneous parts too. I creeped your boards…ripe with carnal and wanton images. You’ve become human again. Sinner. Lost. Beast. I wipe away my tears and thank God you are gone. Whoever is in your life now is paying for your agony. I can feel that too. And I simply send you love and love and love.

It’s all I ever do.