what i'll never get to say
out loud or to your face
i never exaggerated. i have trauma about telling my truth and being called a liar so we're gonna start here. every. single. thing. i told you happened, happened. some happened this year, last year, earlier. i told you that, too. but it all happened the way i said it did.
i never lied to you but i said many things i regret. i don't know if you never loved me, i never let you figure that out. you and he are not the same person, ten years removed. you and i are.
that's why you were able to reach me when no one else could. thank you for my Nico Robin moment. you made me realize i want to live and i don't know that there would ever be a way for me to repay you for that, but i do know that if i stay i'll never get the chance.
for all my strength, walking away is something that i just don't know if i can force myself to do, and i'll never be able to see or speak to you again if i don't because it won't be an option. you know that. i know that.
i don't know how you feel about it because of the block, but i'm sure you're unbothered by the loss. it's not really a loss on your part. i'm pretty easily replaceable for someone like you. good exes and good friends come easily to good men, i would imagine.
i'm taking yours a little harder. you're the best man i know, the only truly good man who has never abused me, lied to me (directly, anyway—misdirection is different), or intentionally hurt me in my life and you're the only friend i'm not allowed to have because we dated fifteen years ago. and, well, that sucks.
i'm a big girl, though, and i can own my choices. if i can't walk because he's doing the work and he'll fall apart if i do, i have to find a way to make peace with what that means for being friends with you. but i know your number by heart—that's what you do with your safety net's number (my new one is also committed to memory—the squirrel, if you want to check in and haven't deleted the whole chat like i think you have).
if i decide to walk, i know i can reach you, and he knows that too. he knows it's on the table, that the squirrel may whisk me away like an acorn for the winter or the year or forever if the problem doesn't stop. he knows why there were no other options left but official ones.
we had all the hard talks. well, not all of them. we've had a lot of them, and i found out we were right about those tendencies. he got the love map imprint from one of mom's boyfriend's, the one who taught him how to shoot. same m.o. as your friend. he got the traits directly from the source.
the people i told you about know all of this. it's the only place, other than here in the void, that i can talk about it still. thank you for making the call that you made. if you hadn't, i wouldn't have pushed myself to make things official and that's what came next.
now we do the hardest part. the work, while my trauma index is a 47 out of 80. the work, while my mouth is numb from clenching my jaw so tightly all the time. the work, when i quit a job i had for three weeks when you know how hard it was to get because my boss's boss got in my face and condescended to me and it triggered a flashback five minutes from the end of my shift.
how do you close out what could be a goodbye forever? thank you, i'm sorry, good luck? i wish things were different? i do, know that. but absent a miracle, i think this is farewell, my friend.
About the Creator
Maia Gadwall the metAlchemist
I fell in love with speculative fiction and poetry many years ago, but I have precious little time to write any. Then, I went crazy and started a cult called metAlchemy, or meta alchemy. I revere energy of all brands, esp. good, kind chaos.
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confessions of a madwoman
for about three months, i forgot how to write. i couldn't draw or do much of anything creative but nothing terrified me on such an existential level as forgetting how to write. see, i had a condition called serotonin syndrome, an artificial build-up of the happiness chemical in my brain and it almost killed me. no joke, look it up. that particular side effect (of a cocktail of medications including a migraine preventative that was the last to be replaced) is a mortality risk and a half and i was grappling with the consequences of it at the same time as an identity crisis caused in part by the only viable solution to serotonin syndrome: serotonergic cessation. no serotonin aids for weeks. around that time i started having seizures whenever i tried to engage my imagination. it was hell. it still hurts a little to wrench the words from my subconscious to the surface and i'm twitching a bit because of it, but i'm afraid if i don't start writing again i'll never get back into the habit and this year has cost me so much already. i lost my mind, my career, my identity, my libido, possibly my marriage, definitely my sense of safety, and at least one extremely good friend whose loss i'm not allowed to grieve except at my therapist and buried in the lines of prose i scream into the void. i am profoundly alone and simultaneously surrounded by people who love me and it is the most surreal experience of my life. i'm in the middle of a full-blown PTSD resurgence, blending childhood and adult traumas together into a nightmarish hellscape that overlaps reality like a superimposed photograph all. the. time. and i'm having some kind of midlife crisis regarding my spirituality but lack of religious belief that led me to start a cult (which i will definitely be linking to when i finish writing this because shameless self promotion is the modus operandi). but in my defense the model is terribly unprofitable because the point is to crowd-source the epiphany to the masses, which means free access to all. the most important bits of the philosophy are completely free, from the playlist augury (which you can use to listen to the will of the universe once you tune it to your channel, so to speak) to the three mantras (which guide everyday decisions in the moment) to the twelve principles (which guide overall values and morals). they play off each other to create an implication of further values, but lack the strict methodical proscription of religious dogma. alchemy doesn't care how you get there, or even what you call it. all that matters is that you serve the equilibrium, the balance of the universe, the source of the energy, or your God by doing good things that adhere to the principles and live according to the mantras. if you don't want to use the playlist augury, you don't have to. be hyperpresent in your own body and do something that feels good while you think about who you are and what your place is in the world. mine is behind a screen, ranting like a crazy person (because I am a crazy person) about my nervous breakdown, my new cult, my impending bankruptcy, my new name, my rock bottom, my activist art that no one buys (but they should, since i don't even get a piece of some of them, so there will be another link here), my marriage, my mother... pretty much anything. so when i forgot how to write, i've never been so scared of anything in my life.
By Maia Gadwall the metAlchemist3 months ago in Confessions
When Silence Speaks Louder Than Words: Inside the Royal System’s Quiet Signals
There is a moment in every public controversy when noise stops being useful. That moment is when institutions fall silent — not out of confusion, but calculation. This is where the story around Meghan Markle, Prince Harry, and the British royal system quietly changed shape.
By Norul Rahmanabout an hour ago in Confessions
Comments (11)
Beautifully honest and deeply felt. Your words carry so much strength and clarity. — Annie from the SoftlyWished Team
This is heartbreaking and beautiful. Your honesty carries so much weight, and you express pain gratitude, and closure with incredible clarity. Thank you for sharing something so raw.
Perhaps we’re always trying to find the definition of ourselves in everything we go through. We try our best, but sometimes things are simply beyond our control. The things we have to do can, at times, feel meaningless. So, love yourself — by gently setting those things aside for tomorrow, or even just an hour later. Give yourself time to do something for you: cook a meal, take a picture, or simply pause. Until you find yourself seeing things from a clearer angle, feeling something more genuine — a kind of peace that makes the weight lift a little. And then, when you look back at him, search for his photo again, you’ll feel it all on a completely different frequency.
Unfinished and deeply human, this work is a quiet note encased in honesty, regret, and tenacity. It is deeply moving how you deftly integrate responsibility with honesty; it feels like being present in the resonance of something unresolved yet vital. Your expressions capture the difficult ground between recovery and goodbyes, when honesty finally thrives even if love cannot follow it. Maia is remarkably well written.
This is the type of writing people save without even realizing why.
Congrats on TS. I've subscribed, as I like your style and vibe (and skill and tenacity too)!
Nice story
Really nice
Always shine
Nice Sharing Content
Really a great monologue