I always smiled and shook off the disregard as though making light of it would make it hurt less, but it never did. It only hurt more. I smiled through the silence, the ever changing story lines of you, choking words up like truth, bleeding pieces of white lies that offered a flag waving. But the flag was red, turning brighter, weighing heavier on my heart with each month disappearing into thin air like a magic trick of how we never happened. And everything was fine until one day it wasn’t anymore. Ruined beyond repair by what you had to do to move on. So be it.

Everyone has their way of moving forward. I’m sorry I had to be the stepping stone of all things evil and untrue to make honesty of you. Being truthful from the start could have avoided the drama you stirred with your own hands instead of using it to hurt me more. People with secrets guarded tight always point the finger in the wrong direction. I’m sorry it had to be me in the path of that blow, but whatever makes everyone feel like a good person, misplacing concern like a friend with a knife, lying. I know who I am and I guess you never did. I never knew you like I thought.

But I know this journey is one you have traveled often. I was never anyone special. You taught me that. Perfect Shot. When someone is already down and you stand there and keep kicking, of course they are going to take longer getting up. But they will get up again. I will get up again. And I will stand stronger and still have the ability to say, our time mattered. I will stand taller and still remember you fondly as the person who made me feel like I mattered for a short time. I am big enough to rise above the part where I never meant anything to you. I know what we were. No one has the power to take that away, not even you. We loved, we lost. The end.

-Stephanie Bennett-Henry