The Quiet Way I Break

I’m dead. Not really, but something in me died.

The spark I had, the will to try, disappeared somewhere along the way.

I wake up, but it feels pointless, like I’m just passing time.

Everything feels dull, and I can’t remember what being alive used to mean.

I’m dead—not literally—but I feel buried all the same.

You’ll get bored of me; they all do.

At first, they say all the right things:

“I’m different.” “I’ll stay.” “You can trust me.”

And for a moment, I believe it.

I let my walls fall, I start to hope again.

I think maybe this time I won’t be too much,

that maybe someone will finally see me, and stay.

But slowly, everything changes.

Messages get shorter.

Silence gets longer.

My name stops sounding like warmth in their mouth.

And before I know it, I’m alone again,

wondering what I did wrong this time.

They all promise to stay, to support me, to believe in me,

but promises fade like echoes.

No one ever lasts.

No one stays long enough to see the mess behind my words.

And then the overthinking begins.

Every small word, every pause, every laugh—I dissect them.

I replay conversations, searching for signs,

imagining endings before they happen,

building walls I never asked to build.

So when someone says they’ll stay,

I smile…

but inside, I’m already counting the days.

I’ve learned to expect the unexpected:

their leaving, their silence,

their goodbye that never needs to be said.

Maybe it’s not even their fault.

Maybe I just make it too easy to leave.

But still, it hurts—every single time.

Like a wound that never fully heals,

only hides beneath a practiced smile.

I lie awake wondering:

Did I say too much?

Too little?

Am I too heavy? Too fragile? Too complicated?

My mind races through endless “what ifs”

until the night becomes impossible to bear.

This overthinking eats me quietly,

gnaws at my confidence,

and cracks the parts of me I thought were strong.

I break slowly—not in fire,

but in small, silent pieces

that scatter across the floor of my mind.

I smile in the morning,

go to school, talk to people, laugh,

but inside, I’m a fragile glass

waiting to shatter at the next unexpected departure.

I wonder if I’ll ever stop expecting to be left behind,

or if this ache will simply become part of me —

another quiet truth I learn to live with.

Maybe it’s my kindness that ruins me.

I could never leave someone suddenly.

It would break me long before it breaks them…

(Typical me, hhhhh.)