I didn't understand what ice was until your fingers grazed my skin while we laid together in bed. I didn't know what bitterness felt like, until i turned my body away from you.
The next morning, as suspected, you were gone. My whole body shook with rage, even before I could search around for the note I knew you hadn't left.
By Sunday I had forgiven you, and by Monday I had made my decision.
The first months were the hardest. By month four, I no longer cared where you were, or if you thought of us. You had made your choice, and I had made mine…at least, that was what I told myself.
Around month seven, I ran into you for the first time. You were different. You had cut your hair, and grown a beard. Where you once wore v-neck t-shirts that displayed your brilliant ink, now you wore a suit. Your glasses were no longer "hipster" but were now "professional." You looked at me, and everything inside me broke.
I could handle you not wanting me. I could handle the ice in your body. I could handle your choice to leave. To see you, in a business suit, with the color gone from your eyes was too much.
Before the ice, you had been a dreamer. Your eyes would light up the entire room when you were wearing nothing but your guitar and a smile on your face. That was when I had fallen for you. That first night I looked up at you, as you closed your eyes and sang along to the song your fingers strummed, and we had realized the heat had been unbearable.
The day the ice came, I prepared myself well. I spent my day locked in the bathroom, steeling myself not to cry. You sat on the other side of the wall--this was our primary source of communicating as of late. Even when there wasn't a physical wall between us, something was always preventing us from reaching the other.
The ice was the final straw. The pink plus sign told me that our relationship was over…After all, you and I were dreamers with very different dreams. You dreamed of groupies and tour buses, and I dreamed of a picket fence and roses.
I finally let the wall between us crumble down, and I watched the color drain from your face…watched the color leave your eyes. So when I crawled into bed with you that night and I felt ice, I vowed to never ask you to stay. It was your choice to leave, should you want to do so. And leave you did.
Month 7, with my belly too big to hide and your shirt sleeves hiding what I knew so well, I knew that we were two completely different people. I smiled at you, grabbed your hand, placed in on my belly and promised to protect our child from ever feeling the ice inside of you. For a second, the color in your eyes came back. You snatched your hand from my belly, and walked away.
Month 9, after 7 days of being late, I realized that ice can melt just as easily as it can freeze.
