At day's end

"I can never write the beauty of this sunset" I say as my knight in shining whatever drives me home from a day of up and down. I feel like a puppet, on strings, a yo-yo who never knows where she stands with him. Why can't I express the beauty of this sunset? It's because what makes it beautiful is the moment itself; both bittersweet and terribly appropriate for what I have come to realize.

I thought that if i could only get him to watch the fireworks with me, he'd remember how much he used to love me and finally be my boyfriend. But I understand now that he will never be my boyfriend. And it's not just that he declined to watch the fireworks ("I promised I'd go to a barbecue" being his reason). It's that I am finally unsure about how many times I can continue to let my heart break for him.

What a strange day it has been. We started off doing something I wanted to do spending the afternoon downtown, then we did some errands he had to do and then went for bubble tea. Whilst amongst slow moving traffic he commented on why when we are together he can never move forward. I joked that he was stagnate. He corrected me, we are stagnate. Whether he was joking or not I'm not sure, but it stung and still does despite my attempts to make light of it.

I tried to make light of so many things today, including his incessant need to pick on me in a teasing way. I feel like a balloon that has deflated. Realizing his fallacy he apologizes and hugs me in his endearing way but I find it hard to accept it as genuine. I feel exposed and I'm hurt because he knows exactly what he is doing, salting my wounds. I said, "What would you do if you couldn't pick on me?" He couldn't wrap his head around the concept. I clarified, "what if I wasn't in your life?" His reply, "I'd probably just pick on myself."

Still, in his house I'm eager to reconcile and quickly found myself in his arms, "sorry I missed your birthday," he says. And that's all.

In the back of his car my things are littered in a bag (and yet among them, no birthday gift). He passes it to me as we drive in silence. The taste of tears is in my throat. The sunset is beaming all around us gloriously. Earlier he alluded to going to see fireworks tomorrow, I know this is my opportunity to say something if I want it to happen. Instead I breezily slip out of his car and watch the day mercifully disappear.