Leave Me Alone – Leaving Neverland

Having also not yet watched the Leaving Neverland documentary, my opinions of Michael Jackson still unchanged, I will make my comparisons brief. There are periods in our lives where we feel violated, stripped of our innocence, used. And when we politely and sternly ask to be left alone, we are haunted still. We are left tattered, worse for wear and for a time, defeated. But at the end of the day, all we ask is for you to Leave Me Alone.

My story is not unique. I thought it was for some time, having treasured every poisoned moment. Throughout the years I was not allowed to move past the situation. I had buried the memories, the desires, the hope that I’d once felt and shared and as if on cue it and he would rear its head of malcontent.

You’ve made it clear that I am nothing to you, that I was foolish in my thinking. You showed me and have told me that you used me. I offered you everything, anything, nothing, and yet you refused to let me be. You don’t own me, contrary to my being denied the opportunity to cast you off into the dark and forgotten crevices of my mind. You don’t accidentally or mistakenly contact someone who you have put out of your mind – you torment them. Despite constant pleas to be extricated from your contact list, you persist.

I am not foolish enough to believe that you hold me in any meaningful regard. I’m just the person you turn to when you need an ego boost when you want to be reminded that you’re desired, reminded of your virility. I’m no longer the fluff girl whose heart you broke and who clung to the hope that you’d see the error of your ways. I was wrong to think that you were anything like the person I once thought that you were. The only time you’ve ever been kind to me is when you wanted something. Evil you were not, are not and could not be a good and decent person, at least not to me.

You came to me with false apologies. In one moment the perfect gentleman and in all others, your true self. Is it not enough that I will always be misguided in my love for you? Must you continue to dangle me on a string? There is nothing cute or endearing about your reemergence every few months. It is all at face value, there is no need to read between the lines.

Most recently, I felt as though I’d earned my 4-month chip. I’d avoided all temptation and was learning to put you back in my mind where you belonged. And like a moth to the flame you contact me again, by accident no less. What do you need to prove, that I still care? I say it here as I say it to you in words and action, I do. However, it’s time for you to not only say that you’ve changed but to actually show it. We are not friends. You made sure of that. You and I are the past, there is no version of the present or future where we coexist.

So if you needed a public shaming, here it is. And even if you did not, it is what needed to be said. So many of us love the ones that we should not, the ones that use, abuse and take advantage of us. We are their prey, the sheep, feeble in mind. But just because we fall victim to their allure, it doesn’t mean that we must remain a prisoner to it.