on being the bullet others dodged

I saw a man I once dated the other evening. He smiled and said hello, and I did the same. It was perfectly pleasant. I believe he's now married, and has kids; he seems to be quite happy.

I remember picking fights. I remember him telling me that it seemed I always had one foot out the door. I remember telling him he could burn any of the things I had left at his place "like he burned my trust in [him]." And I remember how we laughed over that not long after I'd said it. I remember how volatile I was. I remember how unfaithful I was. Unfaithful in so many ways. I remember feeling piercing jealousy. I remember how little I respected him. And I remember how I took his kindness as proof of his weakness, of his blindness.

I remember not wanting him, and I also remember the pain of his rejection of me. I wondered whether the lung-crushing pain of missing the shape and warmth of his body while we slept would ever go away. (It did.)

It is unpleasant to think of myself as that person I was. How on earth am I to be trusted?

He and others like him from my past seem to have recovered nicely. Many of my previous partners have lovely wives, stable jobs, and beautiful children. I don't seem to have ruined anything. But I still will always have been that person.