home is where the heartbreak is

one year ago, in this same house, i was nursing a broken heart. i sit at my desk now and see remnants of the parting gift that travelled 16hrs and 6,000 miles to the place i've called home for the past 18years. the gold-lidded glass jar that it came in. the plastic teacup that housed the aloe-cactus plant for three weeks. the plastic spoon that i used to re-pot the gift christened as 'heather'. all that's missing now is the real plant. it died while i was living overseas, a good eight months ago. and along with it died the heartbreak. or the love for the giver. or both.

i realise that this house has seen me go through three heartaches and two troubled relationships. if these walls could talk, my, what stories they would tell. of nights crying into my favourite pillow. (which, incidentally, travels with me to new lodgings.) of heated conversations with my parents. of sulkiness and brooding. this room is a repository of my past. of broken hearts and dreams unfulfilled. it will always be, perhaps, a place associated with sadness.

it's been a year since that fateful phone call. when i realised that he doesn't care about me, and probably never will. and that no amount of manipulation will change the way things are.

i almost got him to fly all the way to my side of the world. but i decided against it, against playing my final card. because deep down inside, i know he won't be coming for me. he'll be coming for himself. and when you're in love with someone so self-absorbed, you will never find any room in his heart for you. no matter how hard you try.

this house will always hold the heartbreaks. but perhaps underneath the pain, it also holds the dreams. the expectations of something better. hopes that led to disappointments in the first place. but hopes nonetheless.

home, bittersweet home.