I’ve seen pictures of them together, where half of the “them” changes as I sift through the box.  The she’s change.  His past is there.  Old girlfriends, caught in a kiss.  It makes me feel anxious and empty, like I’m a name on a list, worried I’ll be in the box one day, a saved past he’ll hide beneath a bed.  No one extraordinary. 

I have a box like his, filled with letters and photographs, napkins with ideas and I remembers.  It only has something to do with him in as far as where I’ve needed to be to get to him.  But how many times, maybe, did I feel that way too, about the he’s in my box?  Thought I’d been with everyone before him to make me ready for us?  I have.  Even the extraordinary ones are in my past for a reason. 

I still can’t help but feel temporary.  My intellect knows this isn’t true.  But it feels true.  I worry I can’t love him the way someone else would.  I love him so much; I want to give him the best, but what if it’s not me who can do that?  What if I’m not the one who can make that happen for him?  I feel like leaving with all my things because I can’t give him the best life imaginable.  I worry my love isn’t good enough, that I’m too self-absorbed, too self.  Why?  Why don’t I know my own worth?  Why am I sitting here crying on his sofa?  I know how much he loves me… but then I see photos, business cards of other women, and I somehow worry that I’m doing him a disservice.  That I’m keeping him from joy instead of believing that I could actually be his joy.  What’s wrong with me? 

I’m sad.  Why?  Because I don’t feel good enough for him.  Why?  Cause I don’t know how to show him how much I love him.  Why?  Because I’m stressed over work and maybe there’s someone else who won’t want to run away.  I don’t want to run away to punish him.  I want to do it to punish myself because I don’t feel like I deserve him.  I’ve suffered for so long, and now I have someone I love, and I’m scared because I don’t want to ruin things.  I don’t want to be without him, and I don’t know how to give anymore.  It used to be all I did, and for so long I’ve made it about me, that maybe now I won’t be as good as others would be to him.  And I want him to have the best.  I don’t know how to give him what he deserves.  I hate when I say something wrong and it upsets him.  It makes me feel like I can’t do anything right.  Eggshells.  I hate, most of all, that I don’t know my worth, that I actually believe his love is worth more.  Why do I feel so joy luck today?