Letting Go - Jennifer Baljko

She went to the shrink. She wanted to see more clearly the pattern of events she had let happen, that had let tear her apart. More, she wanted to let go of the feeling that she had somehow failed him, the one she had once loved like no other. The man sitting before with glasses, behind his big desk, told her to visualize walking across a field with her lover. He told her to arrive at the sea where a boat was docked. She was to put the man she had once loved in the boat, and send him off. Just like that. He said this would heal her. She tried it. She and her beloved reached the dock, and sat there for hours, long after sunset had chilled their bones. She tried again and again to cast him away. She would give her lover a life jacket, a kiss on the cheek, a hug. She would push him off to his never, never land, and then throw him a line, happy to reel him back in. He wouldn’t go. She couldn’t let him. She did this for days, weeks, months even. Then one day, for no good reason, it happened. She said goodbye. He motored out towards the horizon. She walked away, didn’t turn back. Hadn’t seen him waving goodbye.