The day that we talked, it hurt. I was confused. And like I said, I needed to process. It was a lot to process. He gave me a lot to process. But I only cried a little bit, on the phone with Gyb and then my sister, right after I had talked to him.
The thing is, I always think I can brace for emotional impact, but I am really bad at it. And it always hits me the next day.
The next day, after I had talked to him, I was so sad. Like everything made me want to cry? A coworker set down an empty tortilla at lunch bemoaning the lack of meat and I devolved into tears.
And then that afternoon I was listening to music, and this song played that I've been obsessed with for almost a year now, but man, it got me. Expectation, by Juliet Favero. It's about being in love with someone who doesn't feel the same, and just---
"And you don't need to know a thing
You need to think I don't expect anything
When in truth, the only love I need is yours.
And so my problem, though, is I can't let go,
When I know I might lost something so good
And the hardest thing is watching you leave
Thinking this was just one of those things people do for fun
And that you're not someone I wanna hold forever
In truth, the only love I need is yours."
The chorus gutted me. That's what he said to me: this is fun, but long term, he doesn't see it. And I just started sobbing. I mean, full on, ugly sobbing, just wailing. If anyone walked by my apartment at that moment, they probably thought someone was dying. And I had this sad playlist running, and it did nothing good for me, but I needed it, so I just let it happen. Full on sobbing.
The only problem was, I had a shift in a half hour. So I'm listening to my sad music and sobbing as I get ready for work, and then I managed to pull myself together by the time I got out of the apartment. On the way to work, I started crying again. Pulled it back before I got there, but then I went and sat by my coworker/friend Maz and just leaned against his shoulder. He was up to date on my heartbreak, so he asked, "What's up?" Same old. "Oh, Rose..." And, gem that he is, he spent the next three hours on our shift making me laugh and trying to distract me. It was marginally successful.
That night, I was at work and on the phone with Spo, telling her what had happened, and still really riding my emotions, when a group of EFY counselors came in. I asked if I could help with anything, and they said no, but then they started going off about what a great person I am and what fantastic work I'm doing and how beautiful my name is? And I was not prepared for that aggressive positivity? Especially not when I was already unstable? And I legit cried?
So I posted on Facebook about it, as kind of a funny thing, and at the end I said, "Whatever it is that they feed the EFY counselors, it must be working."
The next day, I see a Facebook notification that he'd COMMENTED. I looked at his comment - a joke about the food- and didn't know what to do. I make it a point to respond to every comment on my posts, but I just wanted to cry. So I ignored it.
A little while later, Gyb texted me a screenshot of my post and his comment and said "NO ONE ASKED YOU [NAME REDACTED] and I said I KNOW. Told her I was thinking of blocking him on Instagram because he were posting with a frequency that was NOT good for my heart and she told me to DO IT DO IT DO IT so I did. Blocked him with every intent of unblocking in like two weeks.
So a few days later, Gyb hosted a dinner for all of our friends, and I went. I was late because of a family thing and left early because of work, but I was there for about an hour, and he was there too, and it was the first time I'd seen him since the conversation, and I walked in and hated it. I hated it. I hated seeing him and knowing what I knew.
And I kept saying these things that felt super super sassy- like very passive aggressive and like I was attacking him, and I so hoped he wouldn't feel attacked. Gyb said she thought he missed it, Juv said she didn't know how he could have missed it, Mok said she thought it was hilarious. Made me nervous.
Man I didn't want to talk about why his summer was gonna bet busy specifically but here we go because otherwise it won't make sense. So anyway I'm a conference assistant on campus here, meaning that I work the front desk for our housing complex, wander around and solve random problems, and prepare rooms when conferences switch over. This means mostly EFY. And his summer got busy right after we talked because he started as an EFY counselor.Resuming. The day after the dinner at Gyb's, I was working the front desk, and then he came in with a group of EFY kids who needed to use the restroom. Boof. There it is. The potential interaction I've been dreading. I was going to wave, but then he was waving, full-on, both arms, before I even could. So I waved back- no hard feelings about my sass at the dinner, apparently.
So literally within the week of the conversation, I'm dreading the fact that I know he's here on campus that week, and dreading running into him, knowing it's going to be fine if I do, but if I never do I will have dreaded it all the week for nothing.
The next day, he sent me a message on Insta. I was so surprised that I didn't look at it for almost an hour, and then it was just a picture of him with someone I didn't know, so I sent back ???
He replies that it's someone he knows because of [activity], and he forgot I didn't know her. I said something about how fun!
Internally, I'm like, Well, I would love to know all your friends, but you decided that's not gonna happen?
Also, vaguely mystified by this, because this is not the first time in our friendship that he's assumed I would know someone connected to [activity], which is a thing I immensely enjoy spectating but DO NOT DO.
Day after, I'm working the early morning desk shift, when all of EFY comes through for breakfast, so I knew I was gonna see him. The second he walked in that room, I clocked him, but I didn't wanna be weird and shout him down, so I wait for the line to move close enough to me that I could say hi like a normal person. In some grand fluke from the universe, literally at that instant something got in my eye, so I was trying to get it out, and then someone came up and needed something, so I had to help them while I was trying to get my eye back to normal, and when I had, the fifteen seconds had passed that took him past me. Like the universe decided I couldn't say hi like a normal person. He texted me and asked if my eye was ok, because that's the kind of person he is, but man
Every time I see him in this week, it's fine, but I want to cry afterwards. And then I reset to dreading the next interaction. An excellent cycle.I unblocked him on Insta the next day. And the day after that, I was walking home in the evening, and I heard this music bumping, so I decided to stop and watch the EFY kids dance, because why not. The crazy person in my head did a little bit of math- there are two sections of EFY and they have their dances in different places, and the odds that I'll see him or be able to pick him out of the crowd are small if he's there, so this should be a risk-free venture.
I rolled up to my predetermined spot of watching (on a path above the dance) and LO AND BEHOLD who's like 20 feet away from me, manning the perimeter? He is. Of course. Because the universe is laughing at me. Not to be deterred from my pastime, I watched hundreds of EFY participants do the Cupid Shuffle and I filmed a video for my Instagram story - took me like two takes to get it right? then I just watched for a minute. At some point, he turned around and threw a peace sign, so I waved. It wasn't until later that I rewatched my Insta story and saw him jumping up and down like a FOOL and waving both arms at me.
I hadn't even realised he knew I was there, and there he was waving, and I was TOTALLY oblivious to it, trying to film the perfect story. This is still inordinately amusing to me.
Somewhere in this week, I realise that he has settled so comfortably back into being friends with me, while I am still trying to find equilibrium. But there is an ease with which he waves at me and interacts with various posts that had been missing for a while- I hadn't noticed it, but now that it is back, I can retcon in some of the stress he might have been experiencing. This comfortable settle back into friendship is good for him, I can tell, but it kills me a little bit. It kills me that I still get nervous every time I see him in a room, that I still place too much value on his name in a notification.Later that night, I posted an Insta story, me working on a song I had written- just tightening up chords- and it was a little messy, so on the last chunk I put a little piece of text that said "jokes I don't play guitar or write songs"
Anyway, I get a notification that he's replied to my story- I fully expected it to be on the EFY dance, giving me a hard time for ignoring him or something BUT NO IT'S TO THAT LAST CHUNK OF MY GUITAR PLAYING and he just says, "but you dabble." I replied back, "something like that" just DYING because the song I was playing was one I'd written about him two months before and just DID HE KNOW and he never watches my stories ANYWAY and WHY that one?
I survived I guess.
That weekend he flew out of state to go do EFY somewhere else. I texted him to wish him good luck.
That hit a really weird realisation for me to, this odd nihilism, where he knows how I feel and I know that, but I know this isn't going anywhere, and he knows I know that? So like? Doesn't matter what I do? Doesn't matter anyhow? No need to overthink anything? It is at once very freeing and also the worst possible thing.Oh, but the day after that, I made a mistake. I was working at the front desk and I pulled up YouTube to listen to music and it suggested for me "Over You" by Ingrid Michaelson feat. A Great Big World. I've never even heard the original, only a killer piano version by my dear friend Als, so I thought, "why not, I'm feelin' it," so I hit play. Honestly I'd been listening to a lot of sad songs, so it was vibes. But then I was really missing Als and wishing I could talk to her about everything (she's on a mission now)... And then. And then I made a tragic error. I decided to scroll through Instagram and the second I opened the app, whose face should appear before me, but his?
FATALITY
I just started crying. At the front desk.
And then I posted this insta story about missing Als (but I couldn't include 'and crying about a boy' because how awkward would that be). And because Gyb is a person who Gets Me, she saw that post and immediately sent me two more real sad songs that were vibes, This Is On Me and I Love You But, both by Ben Abraham. The playlist I've had on repeat for the last month is 27 real sad songs.
And speaking of music... I finished one song and wrote like two more in the immediate aftermath of this conversation. A few days later I had a chance to play one for Juv, one that's just really, really sad, me working through everything. And she really, really, liked it, which was incredibly validating for me.
This was exactly two weeks after our conversation.
Another few days pass, and I was watching shows with my older brother and my sister, and man, this stupid comedy called The Devil Is A Part-Timer destroyed me. Basically, there's this character Chiho who has this unrequited crush on another character, Maou, and it's complicated for a number of reasons. But the two of them are talking, and Maou asks her a question, and Chiho launches into this speech about her feelings, about how she chose them, and no one can stop her from caring for him except her, and I just started crying. My sister asked me if I was feeling attacked, and I said yes, and then she moved to sit by me and they both just held me. They're kind of the best.
The intervals between crises were becoming longer and longer, but there had to be just one more to really destroy me. I had this dream one night, where I was with a big group of friends, and I don't remember who any of them were except him. And in the dream, he was doing all these things that were really flirty, and my dream self was so confused and sad, like, we talked about this, why are you doing this, and then I woke up just,,,sad. So sad.
Had a desk shift that morning, and I was reading this book, Six of Crows, by Leigh Bardugo. I'd been meaning to for a while, and then Gyb checked it out from the library, so I asked if I could read it after her. Anyway, I was reading it and then there were a few moments that just killed me- one character saying she wouldn't wish love on anyone, as it's "the guest you welcomed and couldn't be rid of" and then later, another character trying to ignore the feelings that he has. I just,,,didn't expect to read myself in that book in that way. Then YouTube shuffle decided to hit me with I Don't Wanna Love Somebody Else by A Great Big World, which was a song I had forgotten about and man it killed me.
Oh, I shouldn't go on hoping
Oh, that you will change your mind
And one day we could start again
Well I don't care if loneliness kills me
I don't wanna love somebody else.
I don’t wanna hold on anymore
I don’t wanna hold on anymore
There’s more stars than scars and broken bones
But I don’t know about broken hearts
The wind has changed the way I go
And now I don’t know where to start
What have you done to me
I’m no longer a mystery
Now I’m just a misinterpretation of who I used to be
Yeah. Not a good place that day.
And that same day that fool boy sent a picture in our group chat. He's dyed his hair ginger, which is fine or whatever... but it makes me salty and sad, mostly sad, because I met him at a Halloween party and his hair was ginger for his costume and I really didn't need to be reminded of that, when this whole mess started for me.
The next day, I was finishing Six of Crows and it wrecked me again (for a lot of reasons, excellent book) when people started contemplating feelings. A third character was thinking of his love interest and letting her go because it would be better and she had a future and plans and oof I was legitimately crying. It was lovely in any case but in my state it was not ideal.
In perks, I got a new phone, so his name stops showing up in my autocorrect.
Didn't realise how often I had typed his name until I didn't want to and it was always a suggestion, so it's nice that it's gone.
I'm writing another sad song. It's almost done. I've had like three more days this week where I wanted to cry. Definitely did cry.
It has been exactly one month since we talked and I don't want to cry anymore. Unfortunately for me, I feel too much of everything.
I'm also dreading his return to this state. He's gonna be back for EFY either this coming week or the next (Mok is finding out for me so I can brace) and I am dreading his return. Every time I see his face I wanna cry. Social media is highkey the worst. And I don't know what it's going to be to be friends with him, hang out with our friends, when he'll be just as wonderful as he ever was and I'll be sitting here with all these feelings I don't know what to do with. But also I miss him and I want him back. I'm afraid it's going to suck.
I know I should stop thinking about this but I can't.
It's been a month.
