2006-08-13, 6:36 a.m.,

This is the beauty of traveling; you find yourself waiting around in airports or wide awake at weird hours updating your diary every few hours because you have nothing to do but kill time and think.

I�ve been camping out in a semi-quiet hallway at the Chicago airport for about 4 hours desperate to hang onto this power outlet as long as I can because I know as soon as I get up I�ll never find another one. This hallway is lined with folks doing the same thing, a little laptop ally. They�ve just made an announcement that catholic mass would be held in the airport chapel in 30 minutes. I�m so bored I considered going for the hell of it just to kill some time, instead I�m just letting my thoughts run wild writing my ook and just thinking about the next few weeks ahead.

Some secrets you just have to keep for yourself no matter how much you just want to tell someone. Sometimes they simply have to be something that�s just for you until there comes a time when you can finally let it go because it doesn�t make a difference anymore and sometimes you simply just take it to your grave.

I�m a bit nervous about seeing her next week; really nervous actually. It�s been distracting me quite a bit, wondering what I�m meant to say, wondering if I should apologise, if it would even make a difference.

When we got together about 6 years ago, I knew I wasn�t staying. And when I went to Australia and came back home to sort out everything to go back permanently, she definitely didn�t take it well. She�d cry, plead, lock herself in the bathroom and cut into her arms and legs. I had to tell her I was going back to my parents for Christmas and to sort things out and that I hadn�t decided when I was moving to Australia, although I knew it would be straight after the new year. I couldn�t tell her that Maxie was on her way to see me from Australia to go to my parents for Christmas. I couldn�t tell her this because just the break up alone was more than I could watch her take while still living with her. She was destorying herself and it hurt me to watch her do it and I knew how much it hurt her too.

I couldn�t bear seeing her hurt herself and put herself through all the emotional suffering she was inflicting on herself. I cared about her and although I can�t say I really loved her, it was more what I would call �baby bird syndrome.� She was tiny, frail, quiet, shy and I was her first girlfriend. I felt an overwhelming need to protect her and take care of her although she was a very tough girl and needed no protection.

The day I took her to her parent�s house for Christmas break I knew I had to be at the airport the very next day to pick up Maxie. I knew I couldn�t stay there with her at her parents the way she wanted me to. She cried beyond consoling, she took the ring that Maxie got me off my finger and asked to keep it as insurance that I would come back when I said no, I think she knew. She was hysterical and only wanted me to hold her and tell her that I wouldn�t move away to another country, wanted me to promise. It shattered me to see her hurting, I felt awful but wanted to so badly to go, knew I needed to go.

We ended up having sex that afternoon in her childhood bedroom at her parent�s house through tears. Mostly for me I think it was an apology of sorts for not being who I should have been to her, for not putting her needs ahead of my own.

I remember sitting in my car in her driveway and saying goodbye, telling her that I would see her again after the holiday. Knowing full well that I wouldn�t but also knowing that if I told her the truth she wouldn�t have let me go. And I said goodbye, thinking I would never see her again, drove about 15 minutes down the highway, pulled over on the side of the road and cried, feeling like the worst person in the world.

And a week later I flew to Australia leaving 5 years before I�d hear from her again.

And I�m terrified. And those memories feel like someone else�s life. And when I see her, I�m not sure what I�ll do or say.

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