I am not the first person you have loved.
And you are not the first man I have smiled at with forever on my lips.
We have both known loss like the sharp edges of a knife.
We have both lived with flesh more scar tissue than skin.
What we have now came unannounced in the middle of the night, when we'd resigned ourselves to give up hoping love would ever come our way.
And I feel that's part of its miracle.
This is how we finish healing.
I will kiss you like forgiveness.
You will hold me like I'm hope.
Our arms will bandage and we will press promises between us like flowers in a book.
I will write lyrics about the blue in your eyes.
I will write novels to the scar on your chin.
I will write a dictionary of all the words I have used trying to describe how it feels to have finally found you.

And I will not be afraid of your scars or rough edges.

I know there are times when  it's still hard to let me see you, in all of your cracked perfection.
But you will always know, that whether it's the days you burn more brilliant than the sun, or the nights you collapse into my lap, your soul filled with a thousand questions, you are the most beautiful life I have ever seen.
I will love you when you are just a foggy morning.
And I will love you when you're a hurricane.

Be my rock, and I will be your inspiration.
Be my balance, and I will be your support.
Be my wild, and I will be your calm.
Be my anchor, and I will be your wings.

You're the story I always wanted to tell.

When my ex husband left me, it should have been a wake-up call.  But it wasn't.
He left me with $3000 in debt to the electrical company,  and a house we were being evicted from. I had less than a month to come up with the money to move into a new place.  I found a 2 bedroom apt for Caden and I, in a bad neighborhood,  but I made sure it wasn't far from his dad.  I found the baby sitter and paid her myself.  I'd get to work late 2 days a week so I could go to food banks.  I worked 3 jobs just to pay the bills.  Sometimes leaving Caden tucked into bed alone,  while I walked down the street to waitress at Dennys,  hoping I'd make enough in tips to have gas money for the next day.  I bought Caden's clothes, shoes,  drove him to my Inlaws house for weekends away,  bought the school pictures,  took him to every Dr apt, you name it.  I did it and I paid for it. 
But I was so worried,  so concerned,  about my ex. That every gift I gave Caden,  included his dad's name.  I sent him the school photos I paid for.  I would buy him food when he'd tell me he couldn't keep Caden for the weekend because he couldn't afford to feed him.  I'd help him with gas. I made sure his things were packed nicely and even stored some of his stuff at my house at his request.  I obeyed every request,  jumped through every hoop,  and I spent my time wondering what else I could do to make him happy. I'd even text him when he was missed,  when friends asked about him.  When I had memories of good times.  When I felt he needed a hug or just to be told he was loved,  I did it. And I did it for over a year.
Until the bank called.  They were shutting down my bank act and credit card. I didn't know I had them.  Apparently my ex had opened them up in our names before he'd left and then he ran them up.  I asked them to send me the statements for every month. It was a heart breaking,  soul crushing,  eye opening experience.
He ate out at nice places 3 times a day.  He took his mistress to hotels.  He went on trips.  He would spend a couple hundred dollars at the mall.  He'd blow a hundred bucks on sushi dates every week.  Trips to the movies. He paid for Tinder Plus and Match.Com All the time I'm struggling and fighting to take care of Caden and be supportive of him, I even went 2 weeks eating nothing but Squash and tomatoes from my friends garden, and he was treating me like the doormat I was.  Shortly after that I filed for divorce.
I allowed someone,  who had cheated on me and told me I was ugly and worthless and stupid,  to use me up completely. To drain me dry. All because I didn't want them to feel unloved. I didn't want them to feel as though they had been given up on, or forgotten.
I knew that pain,  exquisitely, and I could not handle another heart feeling it. Especially if I could stop it.
The problem is that I have not stopped. I haven't learned the lesson. And I still allow people to take and drain me.
I go out of my way to help people feel special.  To feel loved. To feel thought about,  needed and wanted. I'm the friend everyone calls when they need a ride,  or advice,  or a meal,  or clothes to borrow,  or just a hug.  But it ends up being a draining and painful experience when I'm done.
I have to stop chasing after people who are not chasing after me.
I have to stop giving love to people who can't offer me simple courtesies.
I need to only invite people into my life who match my effort. 
I need to stop accepting less for myself.
And I'm going to.
Call it a resolution,  or a realization,  or a defining moment. But this is what my new goal is.
And its going to be hard and it will hurt....  But I'll be better for it.

You made your choice, and I'll move on. Trading one heartbreak for another.
Pain has such a beautiful edge when you're in love with someone who sees themselves as broken.
You were never going to tell me you loved me, and not for any of the romantic reasons I had in my head. Simply because I scare you.
And so you'll sink and settle into someone familiar, who's kiss isn't fireworks in your skin, but who's good enough to mostly kill the sting of loneliness.
You're scared and you're closing the door.
A city of bones, and not the first time I've cried in that airport.
Not the first time I've moved out of a heart I thought was a home.
I was happy in this harbor, and now I'm cut loose. Floating alone and confused.
The winds are whipping waves up.
But the harder they hit me, the less I seem to bruise.
Adrift, I had no idea you had become an anchor to me.
I'll pretend this doesn't hurt, and you'll pretend you don't care.
And we'll both pretend to move on.

I've built walls
A fortress, steep and mighty
That none may penetrate
I have no need of friendship
Friendship causes pain.
I am a rock
I am an island
And a rock feels no pain
And an island never cries

You set fire to my skin while placing my heart at peace.
I see your value, even through your darkness. The darkness and light that fractures across your body in a beautiful mosaic. All of the pieces that hold you together and pull you a part and create a human I adore.
And so, I try to prove to you that someone can show you loyalty without even being asked, by holding a space for you until you choose to make it your own.
For you have taken my dreams and breathed life into them. Making them shine with the passion of an authenticity more bittersweet than any illusion could allow.
You honor me by unraveling your secrets in pieces and corners. And I will wait while you venture off path, and retrace steps, to heal yourself. You are still in progress—the transient phase between sleeping and awakening—and I  have no desire to rush your journey, because I accept all of you.
Because I understand that sometimes we have to be taught what love isn't, before we can see what love is.
For all of these reasons, plus more, I will not expect more than you can give and I will not attempt to change you.
Maybe one day you will see me, the girl with gleaming eyes and stardust dancing under my skin. The woman who could love you not only for who you are, but for what you can give me. Knowing that it’s not a matter of whether it will ever be enough—because in reality, there may never be a feeling of having enough time with a man who sets fire to her skin and her heart at peace, but a matter of daring to love you exactly as you are.

This isn’t about ultimatums—it’s about the reality that comes with loving me.

I don’t compete, nor do I come in as a savory consolation prize when what you really wanted remains just out of your grasp.
This isn’t to say that I plan on placing you under lock and key—because I don’t.

I don’t know what tomorrow’s sunrise will hold, and I remain unsure about where our journey will lead us and if that means we will someday choose to belong to each other.  But, what I do know more certain than anything, is that you have a choice to make one day: to either be with every woman in the world or to be with me.

I’m not meant to be one of many, and in truth you’ll never fully know the wonder of my world unless you choose to step into it with me. I’m not meant to be taken in small doses, in moderation, so as to not overdose and lose your bearings in a futile attempt to play it safe. Whether you see it or not, I’m the kind of woman that men spend their whole lives looking for. I’m the urban legend, the stuff of tales between fathers and sons, and the irony that the woman their mother told them to be wary of is the very same kind their father told them to find.

I know my worth,  although perfection is not a word that will ever be used to describe me, or my behavior. But I wasn’t put on this earth to be flawless, but to be so real that I could bring you to your knees with just a single look. I want you to feel me from the roots of your hair to the tips of your toes. I want my energy to dance through you and send ripples through your muscles, reminding you that the only people that find magic are the ones who are crazy enough to believe it exists.

Perhaps you don’t see any of that though—and if that’s the case, then you should choose everyone else; anyone else but me.

The only man who deserves to share my bed and my life, is also the one who knows this. The one who loves me as much as I bother him, but who sees my value every day, regardless of what it might bring. I’m not going to convince you, or beg you, or wait for you,  or even chase you. All I am saying is that I’m not meant to be shared and the only way for you to really understand what life would be like by my side is to actually stand with me for a bit and see what way the wind blows when we come together.

Life is a riddle, and the punchline rarely makes sense.

Yet, whether you are in my arms or not, you’re still with me each evening. Too much has transpired between us, and in truth, I don’t think will ever be the same again. You changed my life—you came in and helped make it possible for me to fall in love with myself. My life is better because you are in it. Maybe it doesn’t add up that I’ve never questioned my place in your life, but that doesn’t mean I haven’t wondered.

Just because I don’t ask for something, doesn’t mean I don’t want it.

Perhaps that is my problem all along; I never ask for anything from anyone. I never ask you to love me, or to only be with me. I never ask you to do anything—but one day it will be time for all that to change.

I think that you could have a perfectly wonderful life without me, and you could spend your nights with different women, sharing your bed and fantasies. Maybe there’d even come a day when you forget about me all together, and I become nothing more than a faded memory that brings a smile to your lips.

But wonderful doesn’t always mean worthwhile.

As much as I think you would be fine without me, I think you would be even better with me—I think both us would be better for it.

I think that sometimes, something special comes along and proves why every tear, every hardship, every challenge is worth it. To me, you’re that something special.

I’ll never pretend that you don’t mean anything to me, because I can no longer imagine being with anyone else. But I don’t know what the future holds or if someday I’ll have to do just that.

But I am here, in this shaking moment, and as terrified as I still am at having my life changed and broken—I am ready to be yours.

I’m ready to throw the dice and lay my heart on the table because there isn’t anywhere else I would rather be than with you.

So, you can have any woman in this beautiful world or you can have me. My heart, my life, and my body—all of me. No pressure though. For the man who truly sees me, this will be the easiest decision in the world. The thought of me kissing someone else other than him would be too much to take, and so whether he knew all the answers or not, the one thing that he would be sure of is that he couldn’t let me go.

And so maybe you will decide that I’m better off with someone other than you—but I’m kind of hoping you don’t.
In reality you could be with any woman in the world, but why choose that, when you could be the one who has me?

The shadow of what we had haunts me.
I remember  you,  and how you'd hold me.
Always keeping me safe.
Reminding me in all of the little ways,  that I was too naive to notice, that I was loved.
I ache to make you understand how sorry I am for breaking you.
For breaking us both.
I don't regret leaving.
I regret that it cost me you because I crave you in a million ways.
You don't need me,  you learned that lesson,  grew stronger.
But I still wish you could see in side my heart.
The memories I cherish,
The way I view you,
And the happiness I feel at being your friend.
If you only knew,  you'd never doubt yourself again.
It'd be an Irreplaceable gift.
Like the one you gave me.
Of being my first love.