I want to call you. I want to text, or email, or send you smoke signals. I want to walk up and shake you. I want to kiss you, to hit you, to demand to know why things happened the way they did. Sometimes I forget, but then I catch you looking at me from across the room, and the feeling flares up again.

But I don’t.

Instead, I go home, to the one I chose when you showed to me that nothing had ever changed, and all the things that hurt me, you were still willing to do.

The person at home is kind, caring, patient. They are gentle and understanding. I don’t deserve them. But I want them.

But I also want you. And it makes me feel sick with myself. Because I’m curled up in bed with this person, safe and loved. But you intrude in almost every waking thought, and I don’t want to get rid of you. I just want you to want me and love me the way that I used to love and want you.

The one at home does. And yet I always feel pulled toward you. And most days, I hate myself for it.