u/Upstairs_Topic_9310

My Dearest Ghost,

I never once cheated on you.

Not in the flesh, not in the mind.

While we burned together, no other woman crossed my horizon.

Yes, when you slammed the door and declared us finished—those jagged little breakups—I stumbled once, barely touched another soul, never crossed the final line.

Only later did the truth crash in like a freight train at 3 a.m.: those separations were never real. They were your backstage pass to the life you always craved, the wild LS you kept secret while I waited like a fool on the porch.

You didn’t even have the guts to cut the cord clean most times. Just vanished, then reappeared with fresh lipstick and new excuses.

I came clean about my one slip later—not to wound you, not for revenge, but because I still believed in us enough to want no shadows between us.

Even while you were out spreading your love that same night, I confessed.

Then I begged you back on my knees, long before I saw the whole script.

You had chosen me as your laboratory rat, baby.

Your personal experiment for the private television show playing in your head.

All those “I love you”s were just lines delivered with perfect timing.

Those anxiety attacks? Stage props.

You pulled them out whenever you needed me soft, needed these arms to wrap around you like a blanket against a world you pretended terrified you.

It worked every damn time.

Who could have guessed the woman I guarded was the one holding the knife?

Over and over you drove it in, no hesitation, no regard for the blood.

While I sat there repeating, “What the hell are we even fighting about?”—you were manufacturing reasons to keep our weekends apart, clearing the calendar for other bodies, other mouths, other lies.

You can hate me for that single cracked moment during one of your manufactured exits.

Scream it to your little fan club, let them clap and cheer and tell you how right you are.

It changes nothing.

You turned our bed into a revolving door.

I have counted the ghosts you brought in and still lost track.

I am hollowed now.

A man-shaped shell shuffling through these rooms where your laugh used to live.

You float on their praise.

I sit in the quiet with the wreckage.

I told you from the jump: cheating was the one line I could not survive—my past had already taught me that particular hell.

You nodded, eyes wide, swore your love was armor.

Then you picked up the blade yourself.

I loved the myth of you.

The version that never existed.

To the rest of the world you were ordinary.

To me you were devastating.

Your heart pulled me under first, then every small gesture, every freckle, every sleepy morning voice became more beautiful until I was drunk on the sight of you.

So go.

Do what you need to sleep at night.

I’m used to the door closing behind you.

You lost regard for me so long ago the absence barely registers anymore.

Still—on the good nights I remember how it felt when you were near.

We weren’t where we wanted to be in this life, neither of us, but your bare feet on my floor made me the richest man walking.

I truly wish you peace, wherever your particular brand of chaos carries you next.

Yours in the ashes,

The fool who still remembers the song

Grateful

My Dearest Ghost