Dear Reader,

If you’re reading this, you probably made me the villain of your story.

I’m not, but if it makes you feel better then I guess I will be.

Love bombs and guilt trips won’t gaslight me back to your arms or inbox.

You dug your own graves, and the silence you sat in, was me walking away.

I don’t write this with hate or malice.

But I also don’t write this out of love.

Some say I should forget and forgive,

But I know that will never be enough.

I know now that despite the empty apologies, you’ll never meet the hopes of my childhood fantasies.

I’ve let go of the wishful expectations, and took you off the pedestal.

I wish you could see, I’ve stepped off the one you set me on.

I write this from a place of healing and growth.

I understand why things are the way they are, and see you for who you are.

But blood and birth doesn’t entitle you to a place within my walls.

Stone by stone, I’ve built my kingdom

Tears shed, hearts bled

But unlike Humpty Dumpty

I put myself together again.

And sometimes through the repair, we have to replace or let go of what is broken.

So I wrote you out of my story

It’s not because I’m the villain,

And it’s not because you are.

But dear reader, I’m putting down my pen.

A.S.