Far

We met working in neighboring bars.

When I first saw you, I didn't fall head over heels. You're very tall and somewhat pale and your cheeks are soft. Without your glasses, you can't see too well so you always have them on. You really aren't my type.

But we started sharing drinks together after work. We'd say "hi." You'd offer a sip of whatever you were having. I'd extend a cigarette your way. But we didn't need those things, though, truth be told. You and I always had something to talk about. That's the thing about you, you're always great to talk to.

We are knit from the same cloth: passionate, quietly competitive, and both with what maybe most nowadays would call silly notions of honor and justice—or at least romantic, idealistic. And grammar, mythology, religion, TV shows, music. You and I are venn diagrams—overlapping and contrasting but however you look at it, harmonious.

There was always something between us, I knew. And as I'd feared (because it was a fear), the gravitational pull of your orbit became too strong and what was once a light friendship, became its own mayhem.

I didn't want to become attached to you. I wasn't looking for anything life changing or more importantly: heartbreaking. I wanted to believe in the sweet lie of "no strings attached," to pass the time with a good friend and when it was time, it was time.

But we ignored the voice of reason and experience. We spent every day together. Almost every waking moment. You played with my fire and I cooled myself on your ice. And our days were full of food, song, walking, rain, seeing, the apartment, laughing. Nights we slept body to body against the cold of the city—the most exquisite warmth I've ever felt.

We weren't perfect, though. We had our fights; we are both broken people, after all.

And life doesn't always let you love even if that's all you want to do. To love is to live, to live is to know struggle, to know struggle is to love, and all over again.

We fought. About stupid things. About things that matter. We almost shattered everything we'd put together. I yelled. You just wanted to leave.

But you never did. And I stopped yelling as much. And my soul burned into yours that much more, and yours into mine.

But the day came that I decided to leave Santiago de Chile and come back home to Atlanta, Georgia.There are dreams that I have and now that we share together that we can't complete yet in Santiago. One day maybe we'll be there together again. But that's a different chapter further along the line. Right now this chapter in our story is to be written here.

But we said there was nothing to fear. Wherever I am is wherever you'd go. We'd figure it out. I was to go home and see my family after two years. Alone, though, so as to set their minds at ease and be their little girl again for just a little more and slowly introduce you to them. But that was our plan—I'd come home and set things up for us and you'd be right behind me. Just a few short months.

In a few days, it'll have been eight months since we last touched.

And I'm getting more and more scared by the second. But I'm trying to keep my demons at bay. The ones that have always hissed at me from the shadows. They say you don't love me as much as you did. They say the distance is tearing us apart. They say we're wasting our time on a dream that will never come to fruition. They say this, they say that.

But nothing good has ever come from listening because, after all, that's all they are—demons. So I'm trying. Whatever negativity there is, I may not know how long it'll last, but it won't be forever. Todo se lo lleva el viento. Time heals all wounds.

We can make it. We can do it. At least that's what I'm telling myself.