I told myself I could leave anytime

I told myself I could leave anytime.

The first time, it meant freedom.

A hand on the steering wheel, music too loud,

the whole world still unwritten and waiting for me.

I wore loneliness like a leather jacket

cool, dramatic, temporary.

I told myself I could leave anytime.

Then you happened slowly.

Like dusk filling a room without asking permission.

Your socks by the bed,

your laugh from another room,

your hand finding my knee in silence.

I stopped checking exits.

Stopped imagining escape routes.

I told myself I could leave anytime.

After the bar, after the coldness,

after the long drives home with swollen eyes

and songs that suddenly sounded too honest,

the sentence became a threat I whispered to myself

like a child gripping scissors by the blade.

Not because I wanted to leave

because I was terrified of needing someone enough to stay.

I told myself I could leave anytime.

Then came the nights where your voice sounded tired,

where silence stretched strange between us,

where love sat at the table with something darker

neither of us wanted to name out loud.

And I realized people don’t always drown dramatically.

Sometimes they disappear in teaspoons.

In habits.

In coping mechanisms.

In “I’m okay.”

In “I’ll stop eventually.”

I told myself I could leave anytime.

But tonight, honesty tastes different in my mouth.

Because the truth is

I never wanted the door.

I wanted the reason to stay without fear.

I wanted love that survives being witnessed fully.

The ugly parts.

The tired parts.

The terrified parts.

And maybe that’s the real confession:

I told myself I could leave anytime.

But all this time,

I’ve been begging us both to become people

worth staying for.