...just one chance...just in case there's just one left...

I'm so far beyond being able to think or know which end is up, I can't function. Just one more chance.

I can't separate the truth from the lies. I love you. I miss you. You've been gone for too long. I think I might give up if I don't see you anymore. That's how it feels, and it's just squeezing the breath out of me, all day, every day. I wanted more than you could give. And you wanted more than I could give.

I loved you all along. And I forgive you. Believe that.

It doesn't matter anymore. None of it matters anymore. I simply no longer care anymore. Hold on to me, or let me go. I'm so tired of being here, and I need to leave. And soon enough, I'm going to have to do just that. I'll need to sever all those ties, and it will all be done.

I can't heal this way. It hurts, so badly. Time isn't going to heal it. Nothing has. Perhaps distance will, if nothing else.

My heart is always going to belong to you. You can take it or not, it isn't like I'm doing anything with it. I'm not asking for yours in return. I don't need that. I don't even want that. But for all the time I tried to get you to do and be something that you couldn't, I knew better than that. I shouldn't have tried. I don't want anything from you now. You cried, and I held you. I held you, and chased away your fears, and some part of your heart was mine. Some part of it always will be, or you wouldn't fear me.

Some part of me wouldn't be broken, and I could simply look across, and heal. Everything would be over, and we'd just be two people, with nothing left shared. There would be no reason to flinch from the idea of one another, if there was nothing there to fear.

Perhaps if there were a couple thousand miles between us, it would be easier. The idea that there could be no chance meetings, it might be easier. For me, and for you. I'm numb, most of the time. But that I still clutch, and stop breathing if I see something I'm not expecting tells me I'm still not all right.

If I'm expecting it, I can prepare, it's fine. But chance encounters that I cannot control, that's a different story. And I have no way of knowing how things are handled on your side. It's not something we ever discuss. I want no more intrigue. I want nothing but peace. Even friendship seems to have become past the point of redemption.

And the idea of peace in my life is paramount. I've made it very clear that for me, I need to have peace around me, if at all possible. I do the things that suit me, as much as possible. I'm trying to keep stress to a minimum as often as I can, because it was quite literally making me physically ill.

I'm still trying to bounce back from several months of it having taken its toll. And even now, I'm still not up to where I should be. I sleep, sometimes 18 hours a day. I don't advertise that point. But it's the case. I nap, sometimes off and on all day. I do homework, I nap. I pet the cat, I fall asleep with him on my lap. I fall asleep reading. I fall asleep at the computer. I have become over-extended, and the nightmares that plague me make the sleep so lacking in restfulness as to be useless. And that's causing my lupus to flare almost weekly.

I fake it well. I disguise the rashes across my face. I take energy pills. I pound coffee by the potful. But none of that entirely covers the fact that my health is getting steadily worse, and I'm severely over-extended.

And I can't keep doing it anymore. I simply can't. I need a break, and since I don't really have the resources to accomplish that, I've done the next best thing, and pulled back into my shell, to try and recoup the best way I could. I'm trying to figure out a way to get my sanity back intact. I have no other choices available. I'm buried when I can, in an alternate reality video game. It's a sense of distraction, and a way to be someone I'm not. That helps. I can be someone who is healthy, and strong, and all the things I'm not.

.......