Being young

PART 3: Chapter 4

  Beyoncé POV

  We can't be afraid of change. You may feel very secure in the pond that you are in, but if you never venture out of it, you will never know that there is such a thing as an ocean, a sea. Holding onto something that is good for you now, may be the very reason why you don't have something better. Why does it sound so lovely to explore but the thought of leaving him pains me so much.  Pain is a pesky part of being human, I've learned it feels like a stab wound to the heart, something I wish we could all do without. Pain is a sudden hurt that can't be escaped. But then I have also learned that because of pain, I can feel the beauty, tenderness, and freedom of healing. Pain feels like a fast stab wound to the heart. But then healing feels like the wind against your face when you are spreading your wings and flying through the air. We may not have wings growing out of our backs, but healing is the closest thing that will give us that wind against our faces. That's what I needed, to feel the pain of leaving the man I love in order for us to heal. One night of hot, steamy and passionate love making can not take away from the fact that we have problems not yet faced. Since waking up this morning I've looked down at him and prepared what I was going to say, he did promise we'd work though it. That's we'll sort this out and we can survive but to do that we need to be apart. So I've told myself,  don't be ashamed to weep; it's right to grieve. Tears are only water, and flowers, trees, and fruit cannot grow without water. But there must be sunlight also. A wounded heart will heal in time, and when it does, the memory and love of our lost ones is sealed inside to comfort us. In the time it takes for us to heal I will be able to find myself, I will be able to discover what I want out of life. In ten years time who will I be other than the woman on his arm, if even that. I am my own biggest critic. Before anyone else has criticised me, I have already criticised myself. But for the rest of my life, I am going to be with me and I don't want to spend my life with someone who is always critical. So I am going to stop being my own critic. It's high time that I accept all the great things about me. It's time for me to be on my own for a while and although I love him, I need to love myself too and staying with a man who can't see me for who I am anymore isn't doing justice to myself at all. It's not making me happy. 

I stood in his room wearing my sneakers and some clothes I had left at his house a while a go with a draw string bag thrown over my shoulder and my heart out on the line as he sat up in the bed and looked at me. 

" Growing up means learning what life is. When you're little, you have a set of ideals, standards, criteria, plans, outlooks, and you think that you have to sit around and wait for them to happen to you and then life will work. But life isn't like that, for anybody; you can't fall in love with a standard, you have to fall in love with a person. You can't live in a criteria, you have to live your life. You can't wait for your plans to materialise, because they may never materialise the way you think they will. You can't wait to watch your ideals and standards walk up to you, because you can't know what's yours until you have it. We must always take the first chance in case you never get a second one, but growing up takes that even one step further and all the ideals and criteria you have set in your head, those aren't yours so you need to make your own" He looked at me sadly, he didn't have a clue what I was talking about probably but he could feel it and so could I. We both felt it and it made me want to cry but I wasn't going to cry again, I've done enough of that already. It was time. "When I was little and running on the race track at school, I always stopped and waited for all the other kids so we could run together even though I knew (and everybody else knew) that I could run much faster than all of them! I pretended to read slowly so I could "wait" for everyone else who couldn't read as fast as I could! When my friends were short I pretended that I was short too and if my friend was sad I pretended to be unhappy. I could go on and on about all the ways I have limited myself, my whole life, by "waiting" for people. And the only thing that I've ever received in return is people thinking that they are faster than me, people thinking that they can make me feel bad about myself just because I let them and people thinking that I have to do whatever they say I should do. My mother used to teach me "Cinderella is a perfect example to be" but I have learned that Cinderella can go fuck herself, I'm not waiting for anybody, anymore! I'm going to run as fast as I can, fly as high as I can, I am going to soar and if you want you can come with me! But I'm not waiting for you anymore" He stood up wrapping the bed sheet around him and I took a step back. "I'm not waiting for you to look at me and see a woman anymore Jay. I'm sorry" I walked toward him and placed a soft kiss on his lips with my hand held on his cheek. "You know I love you, but we need a break" He held my hand in his delicately and I lifted his hand to my lips and kissed it before turning away from him and leaving his room. He didn't follow behind me, he was probably far too shocked too, but that made it easier for me to leave him.  I found a person. And he belongs to me and I belong to him. But... for now, I'm going to be interdependent.