I don’t like making promises anymore.
Not because I don’t believe in them. It’s just that I have this inconvenient habit of keeping mine. And keeping promises, when the other person doesn’t, doesn’t make you feel noble—it makes you feel alone.
Whenever I’m about to say “I promise,” something tightens inside me. I bite my tongue. I step back in time. No drama. No slammed doors. Just that kind of silence that somehow says everything.
It’s because I’m the kind of woman who measures consequences. I always have been. And it’s not that I don’t want to—it’s just that I know what usually follows after the “yes.” The hard days. The disappointment. And when that hits, I’m the one still standing, picking up the pieces.
This… it was about one specific promise.
He looked at me one night and said:
—“I have a problem. But I promise this ends. I just need you to promise me one thing—if I relapse, don’t forgive me.”
I didn’t say anything. I froze. But he pressed:
—“Please. Just promise me that. Don’t hurt me like that.”
And I did. I said yes.
The day he swore would never come… came. He broke his promise. And I kept mine.
He went off to say the same lines elsewhere, probably asking not to be forgiven in places where people didn’t know him yet. And I stayed behind with my promise intact. Holding it like a hot stone—knowing it burned, but not letting go.
I didn’t go back to him. Not because I didn’t want to. But because keeping my word, this time, was the only way I could love myself.
And even though it hurt, I don’t regret it. Because that day I learned something that can’t be taught—only lived: sometimes keeping a promise doesn’t save you… but it steadies you.
And staying steady, when everything else is falling apart, that’s also a kind of love. The real kind. The kind you don’t post about or put into poems. The kind you show when no one’s watching.
That’s why I painted that moment. Not for him. Not for the story. I painted it for me. So I wouldn’t forget the day I kept a promise—not for anyone else, but for myself.
And that, with all the things I still haven’t figured out, remains one of the bravest things I’ve ever done.