Tyler Knott Gregson told me “oh what we could be if we stopped caring the remains of who we were.” And Ernest Hemingway told me to “write hard and clear about what hurts.”

So I did.

From my past, I learned “there is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside.” He was an angel. The worst kind of thing someone could ever be. Lucifer was an angel. He dropped his remains of who he was.

Now this boy, this boy was the devil.

All the hours that built up to days that built up to years I spent in the chair telling my problems to a stranger I pay to listen to me and tell me what I want to hear. All the nights that turned into days without sleep because every time I closed my eyes you were there and you were eating my insides like a worm. A worm of guilt, and I pulled my hair out, and I pricked my skin, and I never once closed my eyes because my soul, my being, was eaten away by your ghost. Life was no longer about living. It was about getting your forgiveness, your approval to move on with my sorry, you-obsessed life. I searched and said the right things. Sweet words slipped from my tongue like poison. I was just trying to poison you like you did me. Brain wash like you did to me and I wanted all of this. I wanted you, but I only wanted you because I needed to make it up to you. I needed your memories to stop haunting me. I need your voice to stop reminding me of the awful that I had done.

I thought my all depended on him.
But I was wrong.

It depended on me. I was the only thing that was holding myself back. I put the chain around my feet and I carried the key but wouldn’t unlock it. And there, when I learned about your evil ways, there I learned I wasn’t to blame anymore. “It’s not me. It’s you.” I dropped the bag I was carrying just for you. I shooed away your ghost and I killed the worm that ate me like a core of an apple. I was done with you. That hurt. That hurt more than losing you and being attacked by your spirit.

It hurt because now I didn’t need him like I thought I did.
And that is the hard, clear truth.