“Hand it over, now!”

I stared at the man before me, the man I thought I knew. In my hand I held a journal. It had been bound, but the lock was easy to break. I broke it earlier, and read through his journal, the one he had been keeping for years. Ever since we met, he wrote in it each night. And I thought he’d be writing about how much he loved me and our time together. But I found . . .

“You’re seeing other men!”

He nodded. “Can you blame me? Look at you! A psycho. And this just proves it!”

Deflecting. Gaslighting. I had let it pass before but now I saw him for what he was. I needed to let him go. Like his journaling, it would be my self-care.

This scene replays as I stare at myself in the mirror, decades later. I can still see the image of me then, young. I can see him too, but he had never had the chance to age. I almost wonder what he would have looked like.