The Breaking Game

When we were younger we used to brag about not falling in love, not getting rejected and heartbroken, not letting someone get under our skin. We were bragging about staying away from the fire, from avoiding learning how to love ourselves. Thinking we were cool and tough. I was happy thinking you responded, and then devastated when I thought you didn’t. And I thought it was so strange that someone else could control my mood so much. 

I never really saw you. I only saw who I wanted my mother to be, how I wished she could hold me and tell me I was somebody. All the confusion and desire I felt for you, the way I waited all day and fell apart from one disapproval. In the end I decided not to let you decide how I feel about myself. Well not the real you but what face of my mother I saw in you. I could tell her I didn’t care, I could say everything I dreamed about. Some kids grow up with real dreams but I only dreamt of freedom, of something like this. 

It takes a long time for my memories of survival to catch up with my fantasies, until I notice I’m composed of more surviving than my dreams. Then I see myself. Somehow the only person that made me suffer was myself. Even as I was a child. Even when it wasn’t me. The shadow of my mother I left behind, like when she let go of the bike I was learning to ride. And I flew away. It’s strange how the child inside grows up inside without me noticing it. The faces of our parents transform into our own. How hard it was to change myself. 

I used to cry about how I want people to think I’m beautiful. How she must have cared about all that beauty. I don’t think I ever cared at all. I used to buy the ugliest dolls. I wanted people to see what was really beautiful to me. I waited patiently to see myself with my own eyes, for her to tell me I was free to go. So I waited for you to set me free from all this caring about appearances. About dresses and dance partners. I never hated how I looked, I hated the way I felt when she looked at me.

How much I know about myself now because I dared to come close to what I feared the most, which was you. My challenge and my mirror that refused to lie when I begged to be lied to. How silly we were declaring that we were powerful when all we did was brag about our own ignorance and fears. Trying to compete with who could be more beautiful, because we wanted the power to make people afraid, the way we were afraid. 

Keeping score of who spoke last and who wanted more, as if that game was the only measure of my worth. And if someone denies us, we try to keep it moving, we place the fear in another place, another person. So we can keep the game going always. And we were so afraid to be the first to break the illusion. To fall out of that game. How brave am I to let you love me directly, without filtering it past my armour, past my own self protection, my pride, my selfishness. How strong I am when I don’t have to doubt if this is good or bad for me, letting you love me without caring when it will stop.