Love doesn't heal you.
It tears you open.
Forces you to look at the wounds you've been pretending don't exist.
And sometimes, that hurts worse than the thing that broke you in the first place.
I stopped seeing Kiaan again.
Not because I didn't love him.
But because loving him made me remember every man who had ever made me feel small.
Every man who had turned my heart into a battlefield and left me bleeding.
And I couldn't breathe under the weight of it.
The flashbacks started creeping in like shadows.
In the shower.
At work.
In the middle of the night when the city was silent, and my mind was screaming.
My father's voice — low and cold — telling me I was too difficult to love.
The ex who slammed me against a wall because I didn't answer my phone fast enough.
The friend who kissed me without permission, then laughed when I shoved him away.
I could still feel their fingerprints on me.
Like bruises that never faded.
One night, it got too loud.
I was sitting on the bathroom floor, shaking, my heart pounding so hard I thought it would burst.
And I couldn't stop seeing their faces.
Couldn't stop hearing their voices.
I pressed my hands over my ears, rocking back and forth like I could physically block out the memories.
But they kept coming.
Faster, sharper, relentless.
I screamed into my knees until my throat went raw.
I don't know how Kiaan got in.
Maybe I forgot to lock the door.
Maybe he had a key I didn't remember giving him.
But suddenly, he was there.
Dropping to his knees beside me.
Gathering me into his arms like I wasn't a storm trying to tear him apart
"I'm here," he kept whispering, over and over, like a prayer. "I'm here. I'm here."
I beat my fists against his chest, sobbing so hard I thought I might choke on it.
"Why won't you leave?" I screamed, my voice a ragged echo. "Why do you stay?"
He caught my wrists, holding them against his heart, tears streaming down his face.
"Because I love you," he whispered. "Even when you don't love yourself."
I fell asleep in his arms that night, my body completely drained.
And when I woke up, he was still there.
Holding me.
Watching me.
Like he was afraid I'd disappear if he looked away.
I couldn't look at him.
I felt wrecked.
Exposed.
Like he'd seen the ugliest parts of me, and there was no way to shove them back into the dark.
"I'm too broken," I whispered, my voice cracking.
Kiaan tilted my face up, forcing me to meet his eyes.
"No," he said, fierce and unwavering. "You were broken. But you're still here."
He cupped my face, his thumbs brushing away my tears.
"And you are the bravest person I've ever met."
I started crying again, but this time, it wasn't the kind of crying that split me in half.
It was softer.
Like something inside me had finally, finally loosened.
I wrote another poem that night:
I thought survival meant never letting anyone see me bleed.
But maybe survival is letting someone hold me —
Even when my wounds stain their skin.