Empty Promises

It still laid on the counter, my ring. Maybe it's small, and maybe it meant more to me than it every could to you, but I still keep it. It is the only priceless thing I have. But I can't bring myself to slip it on my finger. You probably don't even remember what you said when you gave it to me.

"I know we are young," you reasoned. "But we can make this work. I still love you, I'll always love you," you told me, you promised. "If you wear this ring, if you will take it, then I will marry you and you will never again be alone."

I wanted to take it so badly, I didn't take the time to think about what it meant. Every word you told me meant nothing to you. When the condom broke, you wanted to make it up to me. You told me a baby wouldn't be a burden, it would be a miracle, and we would do it right.

Sometimes I still put the ring in my hand, touch the cold shiny metal, and wonder about how our future would have been if you stuck around. I wonder what you were thinking when you did what you did. I can't believe you left me here to do this on my own. I can't believe you ran away from me, from us.

"Don't worry about me. Just go to our place, and I'll be there with you always," you wrote in your note. Your final words to me. Your final words to the world.

A month later, I miscarried. My last piece of you was really gone. The last piece of me was really gone.

I string the rope through the fan, tie it around and give it a tug to make sure it will hold. This is the exact way you left, and I figure it should be the same way I leave, too. I sit a chair by the fan and stand on it. I put my head through the hole I created, the noose I made. Part of me wanted you there to hold my hand.

I can't do it. I don't want to. I try to undo my head, and cry out... but the chair falls and so do I. I'm gone. And when I see you, I realize we are too young. Too stupid. Too gone for words.

So here we stand, in the valley of the dead, with my ring still on the counter. It doesn't seem as priceless anymore.