i loved him so rashly and so passionately, wanting skin and heart and sacrifice and growth all at once, willing to suffer and hurt myself without realizing that such things would indirectly wound him as well. i bled and slipped, intermittently, in and out of my mind, treated reality with contempt and lived for the sake of escaping life, all the while expecting him to love me back and accept it all. i offered him all of me and yet i never ceased to damage and hate my very existence. i lost all sense of self and yet i fancied that i was capable of loving him enough. i didn't. i never have.