What if

~ He was soft.

But his soft came with an edge. An edge that when she walked along it, she could feel both sides swirling against her, gusts of blustering wind, threatening each step. The soft side was warm but it wasn’t eternal, it was never safe and consistent. There was always the knowing that she would eventually fall to the other side as well.

That side was cold. It was harsh and cruel and biting. That side came as a stranger she knew nothing about. Someone who was so enveloped in their darkness, that they had never known a past or future with her. This was a stranger who was not her friend.

Yet she stood before the stranger; transparent, vulnerable and shaking. Stood there, even though she was not respected or chosen. She stayed because she knew the stranger’s cruel tone. The inconsistency and invalidation were familiar. This was love in all it’s pain and abandonment. It was dismissive, it was ugly. And it was never meant to be easy.

Right?

But what if it was? What if it was meant to be easy? What if love was about listening and holding and forgiving. What if it meant sacrificing in order to choose and be chosen, but you never once questioned that sacrifice. What if it was always soft, with no edge and no other side?

And so without him even knowing she had gone, she stepped off his edge. No longer threatened by a wind tipping her into the darkness again. No longer collateral damage in someone else’s war.

~ Alone now.

But she had been alone all along, so it was no different.

Except this alone meant possibility,

it meant opportunity,

it meant love.

~ Soft love.

Even it that love, was only for herself.