I’ve been thinking about a life without you. The return to loneness. I think it would change me to continue this journey alone again.

I remember it. How it was before, the earthquakes. I remember the never ending roll of the ground below me, the instability, the clinging to ghosts and fragile china.

Then I met you and the ground only rumbled never roared. And you stood unafraid unyielding and showed me how. I felt the need to stand with you, stand for you as you did for me. So that even when the ground shook we stood unharmed, unaffected, unafraid.

If you leave me will I still be able to stand? Will I crumble as I did before and lose my strength? What will I hold onto? The cupboards? The drapes? The phantoms I held before never took shape.

I chased them and they disappeared, distractions from flying objects in the room.

I didn’t chase you. I was on the ground when we met.

I’m not sure if you knew how bad it was before you walked in. I hid it from you but you healed it anyway.

Maybe I will still be okay. Perhaps life after you I will have learned how to walk steady, on my own.

But perhaps, my world will cave in without the support beams of your arms. Perhaps a flood will start by my own cause and the door will be locked.

Maybe I need to learn how to go on without you. It’s not safe not to doubt you. But I don’t even want to imagine life without you.