Tripping In The Abstract

I see her everyday. Sometimes she is behind the cash register, sometimes she is in her car waiting for the light to turn green, sometimes she is having dinner with her family. Her face changes, but it is the same girl. The one who was betrayed, the one who roams through life carrying her heart on a broken cross. Although she keeps moving, she never moves forward. She seems alive, but if you know what to look for, you see that she is a ghost, forever haunted by a long ago lover who drank his fill of her affections before tossing her aside. It’s the same story every time. The phantom prince cast his spell, burned his smile into her mind, then disappeared like a whisp of smoke. Sometimes she isn’t even sure if he was real. Time has tried to fade him away, but she guards her memory of him with a desperate resolve.

It’s not just one girl, there are many who have that same look, the look that exposes itself in flashes, just enough to reveal a silent flame that flickers in the deep past. I wonder if the men that they are now with ever catch a glimpse of that flame. I wonder if new love will ever free these girls from old love.

I wonder if loving a throw away girl is worth taking the risk of having her throw me away.

I know the answer to that question…maybe someday…I will understand it.