Bleak

Have ye ever had your heart discarded?

Ye watch as it is tossed away - a slow motion arc - and ye know that it is going to HURT when the organ lands. If you are a creature like Rian, who loves often and deeply, by adulthood you know your flaws and are experienced in brokenheartedness.

You know how to accept dismissal with dignity. You learn how to move on. Sometimes you wish for boiling anger or burning hatred, but in truth the wound developes as a thin skin of ice over a deep void.

Time passes and the ice thickens and eventually Rian stops mourning. But those voids remain, craters in the Self, and you can name each and every one of them, from the little girl in preschool who held Rian's hand all day for months, and then abruptly gave Rian up for a shiny new boy with black eyes to the first college crush to the very latest overwhelming loss.

Life, yes? It is just life.

...last night Rian dreampt that I was torn apart by a cluster of vampires, and in their teeth and nails I found bliss. Simply because I knew they loved me, and would remember Rian when I was gone.