Faults and All

In what reality do you want me? Perhaps in this one, though I cannot fathom why. You blew back into my life, without warning, without cause and I find myself relenting to you, knowing too well the hurt that will ensue when you decide to blow back out.

Though things are decidedly different this time, very different indeed. You are still the same hard, crass individual that I knew so long ago, but there is tenderness about you that was not there before. You still boast of being the hardass that doesn’t care, your actions speak different. You kissed me like you never had before, you touched me as you never had before…you held me when I was falling apart and there was true tenderness in every moment.

Being with you is simple, it is easy. I know what to expect…at least I thought I did. I like to convince myself that I did. You will not give yourself exclusively to me, though you are pleased that I apparently have done so for you. It is a double standard and a double edged sword. I am a glutton for punishment as we have both said.

Though you are not the only one who is different this time. I still cherish you, I believe I always will, whether we are together or not. You have always been honest with me and I respect you for that. You are a broken old war horse that loves to tell his stories and relive his glory days knowing that his stories will neither shock nor drive me away. You are tender, underneath it all. I see it, I feel it…

Perhaps this is what draws me to you, what has always drawn me to you. But for my own sake I shall keep my heart locked away this time. You are the leader in this dance and I follow as gracefully as my two left feet will allow.

I am thankful for the perspective I have now, where I did not have it before. I enjoy your company, your conversation, your intimacy… I do not give you all of myself, not this time. I do not talk to you like I did before. I do not trust you. I do not trust you with me. It has been a long hard road to learn to follow my instincts and they scream loudly at me “I DO NOT TRUST YOU”…

I will not allow you to do to me what you did last time. I am ready for it, I actually expect it. I will ride the ride as long as it is good and we shall part again, but never for good. We are connected and we touch each other’s lives implicitly.  “I DO NOT TRUST YOU”

I do care for you, deeply and profoundly. I see that in your eyes and I felt it in your being the first night we were together again.

I am ready to be away from you for a while. I need to disconnect and reconnect with myself, my life. I long to feel the pavement under my feet and the burn in my muscles as I run. I long to see the smile on Rebel’s face as he runs beside me. He loves you too you know, but he remembers last time. Just as I do.

You are what I desire though and what I have asked for. Someone that accepts me for who I am and doesn’t ask me to change. Someone who respects my strength and my intelligence, who is not threatened by it. Someone who allows me to be vulnerable and will hold my hand when I need it. Someone who can satisfy me physically, in all aspects, but finally understands that this highly sexual individual is not all about sex. Someone that I can have long conversations with, or sit in complete silence with and be totally comfortable. Someone that is independent and has a life of their own, respects that I have the same and still wants a life “together” in that mix.

Yes, you are what I want, every wounded, scared, fucked up, neurotic piece of you. Faults and all baby, faults and all. I am no longer the hopeless romantic or the jaded cynic. I am a realist and practical. We are all broken, we all have baggage, but it is those experiences that make us the people we are.

You are a good man, jagged around the edges perhaps, but a good man. When you decide that I am no longer enough or the thought of being with just me gets to be too much, I will feel the sting of the pain when you go elsewhere. But I will be thankful for the time we have had and the moments we have shared.