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The hardest thing, Reagan would come to learn, was accepting the life that she had to live. One marred by one unfortunate event after the other, fleeting happiness always replaced by loss and the anguish of blame. Good things weren't a constant in her life and she found herself undeserving of them, watching pathetically as they slipped out of her fingers and were laid claim to by anyone but her. She wasn't perfect and never claimed to be, nor felt herself to be much of a catch and found a sad sort of solace in that as a reason for it all. Giving too much of herself was what she excelled at and it was something that never failed to backfire in the worst of ways, ostracized for wanting or even needing more than just a fraction of that to be reciprocated. The decision had been hers, one which she'd come to regret on and off. While Reagan had never been the girl to believe in fairy tales, much less fairy tale endings, she had never expected to ride off into the sunset but it didn't mean she couldn't want to. She had fallen in love, hard, and the point had come where she had found a certainty in believing that this was the man she wanted to spend the rest of her days with. In the end she'd come to question it all, an overactive mind and an uneasy feeling in her gut coming to the conclusion that at some point she had no longer been enough - for him or for anyone else.
Acceptance would have to be much more immediate when it came to the fact that she had let go of what had been one of the best things to ever happen to her. It meant losing the man she continued to love madly, as well as one of her few friends and one who accepted her as she was despite every little oddity and her especially stubbornness. Towards the end, however, the things she had once been sure of were somehow up in the air and replaced with a brusqueness which inevitably planted the seed of demise. Acceptance meant knowing he'd move on with his life and somehow finding a way to be okay with it, as best she could. He'd find someone else, someone who was everything Reagan wasn't, and he'd be happy. It was all she could ever want for him. No longer would their beds be shared by either one, there wouldn't be pointless late night pillow talks, kisses at the door before each one parted in the morning and went their separate way for the day, nor would there be that feeling of completeness that with time had slowly started to chip until the pieces that fell off became bigger and bigger. The things Reagan had "borrowed", never to find their way back to their original owner, had been neatly packed up and left at his door. The only things remaining of their time together being a mattress, happy memories, the first of his t-shirts she had ever laid claim to, and a hole in her heart. Now she found herself on her own again, right back where she had started and the toll being far worse this time around. "I don't want a roommate." She spoke flatly into the phone, eyes darting to the closed bedroom which hadn't been occupied since its last tenant moved out. "You just want to lock yourself alone in your apartment and mope around with pizza and wine, gain a few pounds, shower once a week, and listen to Janis Ian on repeat. Yeah, cool, I get it. But I'm not letting you do that again, Rea." Her brows furrowed, a long pause before she finally replied. "I shower way more than that." "The point, Reagan, is that it's my brotherly duty to make sure you don't become a walking cliché. You said it yourself, man. You don't want to be alone. I'm not telling you to marry the guy, for fuck's sake, I just want you to interact with more than just the pizza guy, your boss and your dog. I'll work everything out, just don't slam the door in his face." "He's my friend too, Evan." "I know. So what the hell's the problem?" "I fuck everything up. Everything." She answered quietly, lip quivering followed by the onslaught of hot tears she had unsuccessfully tried to fight back. "Fine." Finally she relented as she rubbed at her face. "Do it." |