After I leave the room I realize that soon she will ask. And as much as I care for her I’m not ready, and I don’t know how long she’ll wait before she needs to know. So, I have to leave.

I have to leave, but I don’t want to leave her and her sweaters and collection of converse. With her jewelry and her stupid jokes. With her eyes that look like the color of rich coffee. With her hair that is so soft when you run your fingers through it.

But I need to leave before something bad happens. I need to leave. I have to leave. I don’t want to.

That thought alone makes me want to cry. So I go to my closet and grab my suitcase. Rummaging through my drawers I find my essentials; shirts, pants, undergarments, a sweatshirt, and toiletries. And most importantly my past safe and sealed in my notebook. Ready to leave

I don’t want to.

I don’t know how long I stand there just taking in the room. Green walls, and a dark wood bed frame with a matching dresser and nightstand, a now bare closet. Paint splatters are randomly distributed around the room and on the furniture from when we were painting and started play fighting.

I don’t want to leave.

Either way, she thinks it’s been long enough to come find me. She leans against the door frame, looking sad as she runs her eyes over the door we painted together.

“You’re leaving again”, she says it like it’s a question, but we both know the answer.

Maybe this apartment used to be a random place I spent my time, but it’s not anymore. I don’t really know when these walls seemed to start feeling like a comfort rather than something foreign. And that thought makes my chest tighten. Suffocating with the thought that this is going to hurt, because I don’t want to leave and I also can’t answer the questions she probably has.

If there is one thing I know about myself it’s that I won’t be suffocated again. I’m not dealing with the outcome of staying longer, because it will only hurt more.

When she learns of my past and realizes who I really am. Then I won’t be me, but I will be my parents child. The child who ran away to persue her stupid passion of the arts. Than I’ll be forgotten and only my parents child will remain.

“Yes”, I say sadly, not looking at her. I don’t want the last way I remember her to be her looking so sad. I still care for her, more than I probably should. I might even love her. I can’t lose myself in it. Not again, because then they might find me again and I’m not going back. I won’t be forgotten and turned into only being known as their child and not as me.

Never again.

No, and this time I won’t be figured out.

Hopefully.

“Where will you go?”she says,”This is where you ran to the first time. You can’t hide yourself away from people you care for. It’s not healthy”

“ I think I can decide that for myself. I’m not just some project that’s getting passed to the next person”, I respond “ and I do know how to take care of myself” I say as I finally look at her.

This a mistake, because she won’t meet my gaze and looks so sad. I can tell that there are tears building in her eyes. Her stupidly beautiful eyes that I wish I could get lost in one more time.

“No, I know but… why can’t you let me take care of you sometimes? Why won’t you just let me know you?”she says. “I don’t need to know your past yet”

‘Yet’ means that eventually she expects me to at some point, and I’m not ready for that. I watch as the first few tears leave her rich brown eyes and make their way down her lovely face. Dropping onto her soft sweater that we found in a thrift shop together.

I need to stop before I forget why I have to leave.

But I don’t want to. I want to go back to the couch and cuddle with her while we watch our favorite show and it rains outside.

I’m scared to leave, to know how much this is going to hurt. But I can’t stay.

Even though there are so many reasons to stay. The possibilities that follow the eventual questions are what scare me away.

“Then, when you find out about my past , you will see me differently and than treat me differently. It’s going to hurt, the betrayal that comes with the knowledge”, I say.

“So to keep from the possibility of being hurt later on you, instead hurt yourself now?”

“Yes, and I’m sorry but I can’t risk being found again. I won’t be forgotten and turned into only being their child. Not again”

“How do you know I’ll do that?”

“I don’t, and that’s what scares me even more. The fact that there are an endless possibilities of how you could react”

“I hope you know that if you ever do change your mind, there is always a place for you here”

“I’m sorry” I say.

“You could stay, if you really wanted to” she says after a few moments of silence.

“Just because I have to go doesn’t mean I want to”

Without another word I take my packed suitcase and open the door while fighting tears. Only once I’m down the steps do I let them fall, blending in with the rain.

I want to look back, but I can’t because I can still feel her gaze on me. Watching me leave, even though I want to stay. I know that if I saw how heart broken she looks that I would turn around and never leave her side again if that’s what it takes to make her happy.

I was to late to stop the hurt, but it’s okay, because it would have hurt more if I stayed longer.

Maybe one day when I have escaped longer I’ll be able to talk about my past. Maybe I’ll be able to return to the amazing girl with the lovely brown eyes and stupidly cute sweaters and tell her everything. Maybe we will have a reunion in the same room with the paint splattered walls and furniture and the door we painted together.

The future will remain a mystery, but I hope and pray to all the gods that may be listening that I will find it in me to tell her everything before it’s to late. If I’m lucky, than I won’t get suffocated and forgotten and she will be right, but today is not that day. No, but today was the day that I had to leave even though I didn’t want to.

But just because I have to leave doesn’t mean I can’t come back when I’m ready.