Storytelling time. True story. Identities elided to protect the innocent. Although, truth be known, it's hard to think of the parties involved as innocent.

The rationalization is that, at least, I did the right thing. Or, more precisely, I didn't do the wrong thing. Although, yeah, we can get nitpicky about intentionality and all that stuff, but there is still a difference between, e.g., wanting to kill someone, and actually killing them. Never mind if the only reason you didn't kill the guy is because he didn't give you enough time to pull your knife out before the cops came.

I mean, there is something of value to following the Code, right? The Code that all men profess, but in practice, it is more evident in its breaking than in its keeping. So what? Does that make me a chump? Does it matter or not that I'm not exactly the best of friends with the guy? Does it matter that I'm pretty sure that she was messing with my mind anyway, and that she just hung out with me because she liked the attention? OK, so maybe at least a part of her heart was bound to me, but her body was still irrevocably tied to him.

It's not like I started it. I didn't really choose the situation I found myself in. Not consciously. Not deliberately. If there is any error to be found, it is in what I did not do, what I did not say, what I failed to stop from happening.

But it doesn't matter. It's all said and doneâ€â€well, it's at least done, because there was certainly much left unsaidâ€â€and I am left pretty much the same way as when this all started, by myself, with all the time in the world. This isn't necessarily a bad thing. I won't lie. I miss her, but, like she said, some things were just never meant to happen. And I know that, sometimes, it's easier to accept the simple answer than to acknowledge the complicated true nature of things.

At least, I still know who I am. For the most part.