Collide {1/1}

[onlythemediocre]

Title: Collide 
Part: 1/1
Word Count: 1,908
Summary: She's gone, he stays. And sometimes love isn't enough to make something work past time and fate.
Author's Note: I think I start writing this last month; the lyrics come from Jet Lag by Simple Plan. It's kind of between a one-shot and a freeverse poem, and this is mostly just an experiment. Enjoy, I guess...? 
 

‘what time is it where you are
(i miss more than anything)’

———

She’s gone.

He’s driven her away.

She’s

Gone.

/

He’s done this, of course. It’s his fault that she’s gone. He said something horrible and she looked at him as if she had never seen him before (probably never seen him so awful, neverneverever) and he can’t help but keep looking at the picture of her on his mantle, hoping that somehow he can summon her back.

/

Her bags are packed. She’s going. She’s gone. Good riddance.

(No, no, no, no, no! He wants to scream and ask her to come back but he doesn’t have the words. His pride won’t let him.)

The footsteps, muffled by carpet, fade away for the final time. Finally. (I love you, I love you, please come back, I need you, please.)

/

He’s at home.

But it’s not their home anymore.

He’s driven her away.

He’s

Stayed.

/

It was partly her fault, staying away for so long, but he couldn’t trust her. Didn’t trust her. Weren’t you supposed to trust those you loved? How come he didn’t want to believe what she had to say? He hurt her and he quaked with rage and it was like seeing the Hulk because he had neverneverever been like this before. She ripped the photo of them which was on her dashboard but now she can’t stop looking at it. She wants to go back home, but she can’t.

/

She rips the door open, avoiding his gaze. Good. She’ll be free. (I’msosorryforgiveme why did I do this I love you, I love you, don’t let me go)

She slams the door forcefully, hesitating for a moment. (Stop me, stop me. I love you, I love you, bring me back in please, don’t let me leave, don’t let me leave.)

She stomps. Each footstep distances them; it brings her closer to the elevator. She presses the down button and doesn’t look back.

(I love you, I love you, I’m so sorry, don’t hate me please. Don’t let me go, don’t let me go – time’s up.)

The car starts.

/

The clock ticks away. Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock.

It’s midnight now. A new day. But he doesn’t want to face it. He goes back to when things were good, a few hours ago, yesterday. He will pay anything to go back to then.

(I love you, I’m a coward, I’m so sorry, I love you, I let you go.)

/

She drives for a long time.

The radio clock announces it’s 1 AM. It’s the next day, a new start for her. She thinks hurtling down a freeway is a good start, even if she doesn’t know where she’s going.

(She’s lying, of course. She wants to be back home.)

(I love you, I love you, I’m sorry, Why were we fighting? Why did you let me go?)

/

Minutes pass.

/

Minutes trickle into hours.

/

(I love you, I love you, I love you, I love you, I’m sorry.)

(Why was I so stupid?)

(I hate you. I hate you, I hate you, I hate you!)

(I love you so much. Why, why, why?)

/

Hours somehow turn into days, and still. He stays, and she’s still moving forward.

/

(Will we ever meet again?)

(We’ll never see each other again.)

(I love you. I’m so sorry.)

/

Days slide into weeks and no one questions the strange girl who looks tired and isn’t sleeping properly and has nowhere to go. She hides in motels, plotting her next move.

He doesn’t leave the house and their friends don’t wonder where she is or why he isn’t coming out.

/

All

Alone.

(I have no one.)

/

Slowly, very slowly, the weeks turn into a month.

And slowly, but not as slowly as before, the month turns into two.

/

He finally gets off his ass. He needs to find her. He can’t do this anymore.

(I love you, I love you, Why didn’t I do this before?)

/

She makes a U-Turn. She needs to go back. Moving forward doesn’t bring her relief. She can’t do this.

(I love you, I love you, Please forgive me.)

/

The days join and blur and jumble into each other, but it doesn’t matter anymore. It’s like time knows they are getting closer, closer, as if it can’t hold them apart any longer.

They are hurtling towards each other, not thinking of the consequences. Travelling, moving,they’re getting closer.

/

But things that hurtle do not travel peacefully.

/

C     l     o     s     e     r    

C  l  o  s  e  r 

Closer

Closer still –

/

Then further.

T h e  d i s t a n c e  k e e p s  i n c r e a s i n g .

/

T h e y ’ v e

M I S S E D .

/

There is no impact.

They keep hurtling, hurtling, hurtling…

Destiny laughs.

/

He can’t find her.

(I love you, I love you, Do you want me anymore? Am I too late?)

He doesn’t know where to look.

/

He’s not home. She can’t find him.

(Where are you? Have you left? Are you forgetting us?)

She can’t begin to think of where to look.

/

Sometimes, things that hurtle towards each other don’t collide.

They keep hurtling further into space, further from each other –

further,

f u r t h e r ,

a  n  d   f  u  r  t  h  e  r   s  t  i  l  l  .

They hurtle into different parts of the universe, never to collide or cross paths again.

/

Months trickle past and it turns into a year.

/

He’s given up. (She wouldn’t want him anymore, anyway.)

She’s finally stopped moving forward. It’s time for her to stay still. (Perhaps they weren’t meant to be, after all.)

/

Slowly, but not so slowly as days and weeks and months, the year turns into another.

And then another.

/

(The pain of the lost love is always there, a wound in a broken heart.

But its throb dulls over time. It’s put into the back of the mind and sometimes – sometimes – it can be forgotten.)

/

The thing about the universe is that even though there are patterns, there are random happenings that send a new substance into being, or a twist in the atmosphere or a shift in time.

Sometimes, the universe changes the course of two hurtling objects, never meant to collide ever again.

Except

they do.

/

When they finally collide, it is confusing. The wound lodged so deeply in their hearts that it’s an ache that barely bothers them anymore suddenly flares up and it’s like it has never dulled; it’s new and fresh and it’s so hard to deal with.

Destiny laughs.

/

For a moment, they watch each other at the small coffee shop, towns over from where they began, a place where they do not usually reside. He’s here for business and she’s here on the way home.

He sees her holding the toddler and cooing and suddenly it feels like he’s still stuck in that too-small apartment that they could barely afford to keep and he hadn’t run after her.

She sees him nursing the coffee cup and the gold band shining on his finger and it’s like she’s still travelling at that unrelenting speed on the highway and running out of energy and she hadn’t come back.

/

Collision is a messy, messy thing.

It hurts.

/

The world has fragmented into little pieces and they can’t tell what is real or not anymore.

(Because this, this wasn’t resolved. There was no end. There was only hiding in the corners of the mind and escape.)

/

“Hello.”

“Hey.”

The first words of lovers reunited, but with the knowledge they won’t be lovers anymore.

/

He asks about her son, and she explains that her partner is on duty, serving the country with pride, but he’ll be home in a month and he’s safe – for now. Marriage isn’t really on the cards but they’re happy and their little boy flourishes every day. (There will never be a child with her nose and his smile, who will never have to live its first months of life in the too-small apartment.)

She asks about his wife, and he tells her that she’s a primary school teacher, too in love with teaching other people’s children how to dream and open their minds to knowledge that she barely thinks about having her own. Still, he’s happy and he learns something about her every single day and she never fails to surprise him. (There will never be that proposal during a movie with the ring at the bottom of the popcorn bowl, which he always threatened to do, and there won’t be the small church two blocks over with him waiting for her in his wrinkled suit while she wears her white sundress.)

/

“Well… I have to go. Traffic and all.” “I loved you, I really did. I’m so sorry I left. I loved you.”

“Yeah, I understand. I have a meeting in an hour – better get back to my hotel.” “I loved you. I loved you so much. I’m so sorry I stayed. I loved you.”

The last words of people reunited, once lovers, but now strangers to each other now.

/

He’s gone.

Time and fate have driven them apart.

This time,

He’s

Gone.

/

Her mind goes back to when she stepped out of that door and left him behind, thinking maybe she would come back or maybe he’d pull her back in and they’d work through it. But she feels the weight of her son in her arms and she thinks – maybe it was supposed to be this way. His picture still might be hidden in the compartment of her car, never restored to its position on her dashboard, but she knows for sure now. Her heart aches but it’s nothing compared to the sickening feeling she gets when she considers a life without her son. She is no longer able to move with the tide; her son has anchored her down. Perhaps that was for the best. (was it? maybemaybemaybe)

/

She’s still in the coffee shop.

It doesn’t mean anything to either of them.

Time has driven them apart.

This time,

She

Stays.

/

His mind goes back to when she left with him with one last tearful glance and he thought she’d be back once she blew off some steam. But he never had the guts to go after her and she never did come home. The sunlight glints off of his wedding band and he’s reminded of his wife – jubilant, sometimes just as radiant as the sun. He loves her, he knows – perhaps the pain was to prepare himself for her and to appreciate all of her. He feels like he has no stomach because for a moment he can’t decide whether he couldn’t live without the one who left him or the one he has, but his wife’s bright smile lingers in his mind and he knows perhaps, that’s the answer. (is it? maybemaybemaybe)

/

(I loved you.)

(I loved you.)

(I hope they make you happy now.)

———

‘i keep your picture in my car
(i hate the thought of you alone)’

 

/fin./