I don't remember things.
Remembrance is a gift, you see. Something that one is either born with, or without. And if one is lucky, remembering the burning color of the sky at sunset or the tangy taste of a favorite childhood food will stick. And even as vision fades and taste buds weaken, the memory of these things will still exist. But some of us are not so lucky.
I struggle.
I struggle to remember my father's birthday and the last conversation I had with my favorite uncle and what my brother had said to me to calm me down the night I cried so hard that I collapsed on the bathroom floor and wondered why things were so god damn difficult.
I struggle to pinpoint the day it all went wrong; the day I couldn't tolerate the pain in my heart anymore so I began replacing it with the pain I caused on my body because anything, anything, could be better than the 1st degree burns on the inside of my scalp or the the valves in my heart that were frozen shut from the cold.
But I remember, the day I began to remember.
Otherwise known as the day you came into my life.
I don't know what it was about you that triggered something within me. That exposed the beautiful nature of remembrance. I don't know how you managed to extinguish the flames in my mind or melt the ice in my heart or make me think that I wasn't so worthless after all.
Because I finally remembered.
I remembered the first day I laid eyes on you. God, you were so beautiful that day. You had twisted your ankle because you were clumsy enough to fall off a curb so you had this limp. I will never forget how you hopped around on one foot just to come over and talk to me because you thought that the slight pain in your ankle was worth a few scattered words with me.
I remembered why purple was your favorite color. You told me it wasn't a happy color; that it struggled at the end of the spectrum to find a place within the other colors and hoping, that one day, it wouldn't have to feel so alone. That it would continue on until it finally met red at the other side. That, although it wasn't a "happy" color, it was still beautiful in all of its captivating forms. That you were just like the color purple.
I remembered the sparkle of the stars in your eyes the night we sat on the hood of my car and stared at the sky, thinking about nothing but each other. The reflection of the moonlight on your freckled skin and the way you ran your fingers through your wind blown hair was just enough to send a bitter chill down my already frozen spine. I remembered how crazy that damn wind drove you.
I remembered the freckle in the middle of your back that you always hated but I had loved because I had loved all of you and every part of your body I thought was beautiful.
I remembered everything.
But, what I remembered the most, was the day you left.
How you told me it was too late to call at 11 pm when we used to stay up until 3 in the morning and fall asleep on the phone and how the bitter words you sent to me ached as I read them in your voice and as they echoed in the walls of my mind and how you simply said you didn't want to do this anymore. I remembered how the embers in my mind sparked back to life and lit my head on fire and how the ice in my heart that had melted into warm water froze up once again, stronger than before. How the concept of worthlessness had slipped out of the grave you had buried it in and grew wings that made it fly around and occupy every crevice in my soul. I remembered that while I was falling in love, you were thinking of ways to tell me you weren't.
I remembered everything.
And for once in my life, I would've given anything just to forget.