Coming of Age

"Ex-boyfriend," was that what you planned to be all along? Was I entertainment, something pretty for your arm, a way to improve your status among the boys? If that's the case then you were never my boy friend, more of an amateur manipulator, a child in a man's body. Do you know, my "friend" what happens to children who play with fire? They are burnt of course. So in as much as you have scorched my insides, charred what was whole, you have brought an inferno on yourself. It's not that I'm not over you, that part was easy, I did that on day one. My mama told me to "live and let live," "to forgive" and "be the bigger person." The problem with that is I'm not yet mature enough to listen to my mother. Perhaps I will be when my revenge lies cold at your feet, a million glass fragments flashing in wintry light, ready to cut you no matter the direction you take.

Coming of Age

..."Ex-boyfriend," the word alone is enough to make me choke. In my dreams we were married, then came the babies... Now he is my ex and I'm supposed to be okay with that. Well I'm not. I want him back. He loved me once, how can that just go away? How can love evaporate so fast?

I'm standing at the window again, eyes on a street I have no interest in. I can't care for the passing cars or the elderly. I'll remain here until something causes me to move away, perhaps a couple holding hands will set me off. My head keeps re-examining our last moments together, what I said, what he said... I re-read his texts, my replies... always wondering what I should have done differently. In my heart I know there's another girl with her claws in him and my stomach turns sickly again.

Coming of Age

My ex-boyfriend is like a lava lamp. He has all these high emotions that make him so attractive, they tumble about, taking their turns to rise and fall. But when all's said and done they really don't get him anywhere, the cycle just starts over again. I used to spend my time reading stupid articles about "How to win your ex-boyfriend back," but not anymore. I see the girls fawn over him, attracted to the same vibrancy I was, unaware that his excitement comes at a price. Duller packaging is alright with me so long has they have the ability to learn from their mistakes and develop as a person. I'll always be his friend, but I'll let someone else mop up after his next impulsive mistake...

Coming of Age

Hating my ex-boyfriend is like a snake eating it's own tail, or worse. It hurts me more than it hurts him and it just keeps going round and round. Everyone says it passes with time, that I'll move on when I find someone new. Beneath the smile I return to them is more than doubt. After Tim I'm not the same girl anymore, there's a purity, a naivety that died. I envy those that marry their childhood sweethearts, the ones that never feel the keen sting of betrayal, the anguish of forming a bond so strong only to have it ripped from your still beating heart. It's an invisible wound that never gets treated and the infection only gets worse. I'm still me, but with a caution and a tinge of bitterness I never wanted. In the end, that's all Tim really gave me. Perhaps that's why the hate is so intense, he changed who I am for the worse, made me close down at the very age I should be open to new love.

Coming of Age

There is no way on God's green earth that I will let Tara keep Leon. She loves to casually remind me that he's my ex-boyfriend, that she is the one he gives his affection to. In time I'll show him what a viper she is, in time she'll just be a fading memory we laugh about over drinks, until one day neither of us can recall her name. She'll be a footnote, nothing more. Then Leon will come back to me, and not just on the rebound like he is with her, but for real, forever. It's time to play the long game, play for keeps, because what she doesn't know is the way he drops his voice when he's feeling love, they way he flicks his eyes to the left - and he does that with me all the time.

Coming of Age

I want Michael to miss me, miss me like there is a part of him dying. I want to take him to a place of utter devotion and need, then crush him like he crushed me. He likes sexy, I can be the best looking girl in town when I put in some effort. He likes soft and vulnerable, not hard to pull off since that used to be me. He likes girls that don't challenge his intellectual superiority, that's tougher since he could be outwitted by a brick. I'm ashamed to call him an ex-boyfriend, but since he's saddled me with being one of the "notches" he brags about, revenge isn't so much an option than an obligation. This is one girl he's gonna wish he'd treated better.

Coming of Age

Jolene has ex-boyfriends by the dozen, if she didn't have a cell phone she'd need a rolodex just to keep track. No me though. I just have one. I miss him with the kind of sadness that sinks my bones into the earth while I still live and breathe. I want him back and the weight of the longing bows my head and brings a heaviness to my eyes. It makes my heat beat slower and hides the beauty of the world behind a dark filter. Robert told me he loved me and I gave him everything I was. I became half of something greater and now I am merely half of what I was before our love came to be.

Coming of Age

I never understood the girls who hated their ex-boyfriends, one week giggling at their lame jokes and the next spreading nasty rumours. That was until Liam. There are times I try to fight the hate that winds around my guts, and other times I run with it. It's a cycle of sorts: falling into memories of us (the sweeter the more painful), wanting him to feel the hurt I do with an intensity that's dangerous, allowing the pain to ebb do a duller form. Perhaps that's why so many take revenge on their ex-boyfriends, anything to stop the destructive cycle inside...