Cleaning House

The day he moved out I came home from work late one day. I still can’t help but think that had I not come home late that day, would we still be together? I’ve gone over that day in my head a thousand times. As soon as I pulled into the garage, my heart sank. I had a sinking feeling that something was wrong. I came home and all looked well. Then, about to start the very menial task of laundry, that’s when I realized all his stuff was gone. I couldn’t believe that after everything we’d been through and everything he’d put me through, not a note nothing. Just gone. I called him. No answer. He eventually came back to at least give me a goodbye. His eyes were dead. I couldn’t believe that this was actually the person who I thought was my lifemate and who I thought I was going to spend the rest of my life with nine months ago.

I told him that if he left, my door was closed. Forever. I’ve never been one of those people to look back. Once I break up with someone, that’s it. Done. Once he left, I felt the need to immediately clean the apartment of every trace of him. First to go, wedding pictures. I was frantic. I was running around the place crying and throwing everything that had a hint of him into garbage bags. Friends and family came over to console me. All I wanted to do was rid the place of him. I threw out the sheets he had slept in, threw out shoes, clothes, you name it. Anything he left behind. For weeks, I would wake up in the middle of the night and remember something that belonged to him. When the garbage can got so full of his stuff, I remembered that it was his garbage can. So that went to. There was something so exhilarating about clearing the place of any sight, smell and sound of him. Now, I could concentrate on picking up the pieces.