day 22

dear ___________,

everything, everyone, every shred of rational thought in my head tells me not to love you. but i don't, honestly, know how to stop.

you're afraid you're not good enough, that you've messed up too badly, that you have something to hide. and you steal happiness from others to prove that you're exactly who they think you are. the only thing i can say in response is… you're absolutely right. you don't deserve their love. you don't deserve their forgiveness.

but this is about me. i am flawed in a way that stems from the same fact that i don't love myself. except that while you're reckless with others' hearts, i'm reckless with my own. and in my whole life, i have never stopped loving someone because of the things they have done. i love you not because of who you are, but because of who i am.

i didn't feel this way at first. i didn't think i could. what you did, it gave me reason to manage my expectations from the very beginning. i set up walls, boundaries--and i told everyone they were uncrossable. you did so many things to hurt me, to shock me, to test my limits. i was unfazed because i kept my heart in a tightly locked box.

or so i thought. the problem is, you were also kind. selfless and gentle. i opened myself up to you and you did the same. except while it's a daily occurrence for me, i knew how much it meant to you. you were sincerely wonderful, and the past began to feel incredibly distant. i began to wonder if you might love me after all, even though i had convinced myself that we were impossible.

i don't know when it happened, but one day something from your past came up and i came to the sudden realization that i did care. i cared about the awful things you did. something that hadn't bothered me previously now hurt me deeply and i couldn't understand why. i suppose all those things had been waiting at the door for the moment i let my guard down.

i believe that you love me, in the way that you know how. you say you want a second chance, but i don't think you really know what that means. i guess it doesn't matter because you know i'll give it to you. and a third and a fourth and many more, if you need it. not because i want to. but because i've given you my heart and i don't know how to get it back.