Forgive, sounds good.
Forget, I don’t think I could.
They say time heals everything, but I’m still waiting.

I don’t usually listen to country music, but this song by the Dixie Chicks has been on my mind all day. Okay, the first part is kind of a lie, but it would not be a lie to say that I do not willingly listen to country music. All of that is beside the point. I’m writing this to say that a big chunk of me is “mad as hell” and “can’t bring myself to do what it is you think I should.”

I hate AC. I hate the way he looks. I hate the way he acts. I hate his orange apartment building. I hate his stupid, ugly handwriting. I hate the way his voice changes when he talks to other people. I just hate everything about him, and I have been, for over a year now.

It’s kind of a long story. In the short version, AC is just a boy, and I am just a girl. Maybe I expected too much. Then, I was too stupid to know that jealousy is not cute. And that it didn’t mean that he cared more about me than the boys who were never jealous. I was too distracted by the way he told me I was beautiful, that I was the best thing that ever happened to him, and that he loved me, to consciously dwell on the fact that he thought he was better than me. That he said he was better, and that I was less, and that he couldn’t be with a girl who was just a little more. Like an acid, it ate at me. Like a tumor, it grew. Like a landmine, he tiptoed around it until there was no where left to go. Boom.

Hating him this much is a lot of work. It takes a lot of effort to cringe whenever I hear his name, or when a song he used to like comes on the radio, or when I look at the spot on the street where he used to park to visit me at my house when I was too upset to talk to him on the phone or when I told him I just needed time to sort things out on my own. Being this bitter probably makes me more unhappy than it makes him.

I won’t say why I hate him, but you’ll have to trust me enough to believe that he deserves it—that whatever he did to me was bad, and my hatred is justifiable. Just trust me when I say that I was right, and he was wrong.

Anyway, I went to church on Sunday, and of course, I was convicted. The sermon was on the F word. Even more offensive than the one you’re probably thinking of—Forgiveness. Ick. Don’t worry. I’m not going to go religious on you. I think forgiveness is something that everyone struggles with, Christian or not. Holding a grudge against someone, refusing to forgive them, is like drinking poison and waiting for the other person to die. At least, that’s what I was told. And, a part of that is true…

No... All of it is true. Every word. I hate AC and I wish he could feel how much I hate him, and none of my wishing and hoping he keels over is going to do me any good. In fact, I’ll probably keel over before he does if I don’t let this go. I can feel it all over me. It’s like a big, fat dragon wrapped around my neck, twisting over my arms, my chest, my legs. It’s harder to breathe now, than it used to be. It’s harder to walk without falling, too. Maybe it’s time to let go. One step at a time. AC, if you’re reading this, even though Third Eye Blind was your favorite band, I can still find it in me to like “Jumper”.