Three Little Words

I'm sitting here thinking. Just contemplating. I do that quite often when I'm alone; and I am alone quite often now. Being single again isn't all it's cracked up to be you know.1

Once you had a purpose in life, you were half of a whole so therefore you had things to do. Get up, go to work, get home and make dinner. Wash, iron and do housework. Go to bed, make love then go to sleep. It was all set out for you. Didn't matter when you did things or in which order. Just as long as you got everything done it was enough.2

Now I feel it is just enough to get out of bed each morning and go to work. I make pleasant small talk with people at work. I really could care less how their partner is or how the kids are doing but I ask nonetheless. I smile and nod agreement with them and I laugh with them. It's just a part of me resents them for their fulfilling life. Why should they have it all when I have nothing?3

Of course, I have no right to judge them or their life because they may in fact, like their life the way it is.
I keep asking if there is something more to it. More than finding a partner, having kids and a beautiful home. It's probably because I had all that and it sucked big time!4

I often wonder when someone is waffling on about how great their son did at school or how generous their partner was when he brought home flowers for their anniversary. I wonder if they have ever just said to one another 'I love you'. Not for a reason but just becasue they wanted to say it because they felt it.5

I used to say it alot. I never had it returned in all my twenty years of marriage. He would always reply 'Me too." You wouldn't think that three little words could be that hard to get out of one's mouth. Yet they are.6

So now I am sitting here in my empty house just thinking about if he can say those words to someone else. Does he feel the need to tell her those words or is he self assured enough now to trust she does without ever asking her.7

Did he tell her about the daughter he had with me that he lost. Would he be honest in his assessment that he made a bad choice when it happened and closed himself off from everybody and accepted no help for it at all.
Could he recount the pain he caused when he refused to acknowledge the existence of this baby when people asked if he had children. The pain I felt when he cut me off from explaining the sorrow and sad event. From ever telling the truth.8

I guess he felt better about it that way. I imagine she has no idea that there is a little piece of his heart that is locked away; so far away from reality that it may even cease to exist anymore. Would she be jealous to realise that I know it to be there and only I know why.9

If she had been aware that during the whole sad affair I knew she existed. To the point that I knew her cell phone number off by heart. Simply by reading it aloud from his phone bill I paid every month. The number that appeared many times a day, that cause a stabbing pain in my heart that refused to go away.10

Would she care? I think not; just as now I do not care about her or him. It's been many a long hour and day since that final one. Many a month since tears were shed over it and many a year since anger was the first emotion that overtook me. 11

Yet as I sit here alone on a cold and rainy Winters' night I do think of him and her. I wonder if they feel as satisfied with each other as I do with myself. He went from me to her and the routine was never really broken for him. I went it alone, made new friends, got a new house and slept alone for the first time in twenty years. I went out to clubs with friends and stayed out all night. I danced, I sang and drank and most of all I laughed and loved like it was twenty years ago. With all that had passed me by I still could manage to say those three little words.12

So I sit here wondering....if only he had said.....
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