outsideinanddownsideup:

Inspired by this prompt. 

I spent the entire first year without you completely alone inside my mind. While other girls my age were chasing boys and being chased by boys, I stayed in my dorm room, filling my time by watching Lost and reading fluffy romance novels by Rachel Hawthorne. Anything that took my mind off of you was good, but not as good as anything that reminded me of you. I kept the perfume you gave me, but I could never wear it without feeling the sting of tears in my eyes. I folded the letters you wrote me during my initial year away, when we were still…well, when we were “we” and not just  ”you” and  ”me.” I analyzed your handwriting to see if it changed as much as you did before things ended, before you disappeared. 

I cried almost every night for the first year. I cried because I missed you. I cried because you left me. I cried because I couldn’t imagine the rest of my life without you. But mostly, I cried because you didn’t even tell me that you were going. I heard from a mutual friend of ours that you had gone. She called me, panicked, because she knew I would be devastated about your absence. She thought she should try to comfort me, but somehow she was the one to bring me the pain. You didn’t even have to decency to do that yourself. I didn’t cry that night. I told her that I’d had no idea you had left and after convincing her I would be okay, I just sat at my desk, holding my phone in my hand and staring at my door. What if I left too? What if somehow I could find you? It wasn’t like you to just leave with no trace, you would have left behind some clue telling me where to find you again. But that’s exactly what you did. You actually just disappeared, as though you had never been a part of my life. 

After a night and day of complete shock, it finally hit me. I would never see you again. You would never hold your arms open for me to fit into again. I would never feel your hand brush my hair off my cheek again. We would never dance together again. I would never joke with you, laugh with you, even talk to you ever again. When the painful realization hit, it hit hard. Suddenly, I couldn’t breathe and my stomach felt like it had turned to stone. I stumbled to my bed and sank to what had once been a comforting cocoon of blankets. Now they engulfed me, squeezing what little life I had left out of me in the form of tears. That swamp of blankets became my cave of solitude for a few days. I didn’t leave, I didn’t sleep, I didn’t eat. I gave up dancing.  

Eventually the shock and the pain subsided enough for me to at least pretend to be okay. My friends had no idea where I’d been, but I got the feeling they were all too afraid to ask. I went from being overwhelmed with emotions to feeling almost nothing at all. Without you, I felt I had nothing. I had no reason to smile or to laugh, let alone a reason to dance and act joyous. I didn’t know what to do without you, so I did nothing. I did a lot of sitting and staring, at people, at walls, at blank space with nothing in it. I remember doing a lot of thinking, but I can’t remember what about, except that a lot of it revolved around how I couldn’t bear to think of you.

I started dreaming in my sleep again, though my periods of sleep were brief. One dream repeated over and over again. It was a dream that you came back. We were at the dance studio we both loved, you were in the lobby and I entered through the front door. You didn’t see me at first, but I knew you were there the second I stepped foot on the floor. When I saw you, it was all I could do to stay standing. I froze in the doorway, locked my knees and stared. You looked up at me from across the room and smiled slowly. You came to me, asked me to dance. We waltzed to “our” song, Open Arms by Journey. You spun me around the floor, we were the only ones on it and you took advantage of the space, yet kept me pressed up against your frame. I always woke up before the end of the song. 

The first year without you passed slowly. I wouldn’t have even noticed it had been a year if someone hadn’t reminded me by asking how I was doing. I went home for Christmas, remembering how much I had been looking forward to spending the previous one with you. I drove past our studio, but I couldn’t bring myself to even look inside. Everywhere I went in my hometown reminded me of you. I left as soon as I could after New Years. I spent most of the break inside and never bothered trying to be social. Even after a year, your disappearance affected me so deeply that I still didn’t know how to act like a living, breathing human without you. I tried eventually, as my friends reached out to me and told me to continue living my life, I tried. 

I made new friends eventually. I started dancing again, not ballroom like I used to do with you, but ballet, jazz, and modern. I plastered on my band-aid smile for performances and acted as assistant to the teachers, doing whatever I could to fill my time with something other than my own thoughts. My life was slowly coming together again when my parents suggested moving back home and looking for a job closer to them.

The only thing I wanted to do anymore was dance, but the only studio near home reminded me so strongly of you. I tried anyway. I went into the studio on a Friday night, during the social dance party, so I could sneak in and back out after having a conversation with the owners. The lights were turned down low as I slowly opened the door. Couples were dancing, twirling around the floor and an instant feeling of jealousy and regret washed over me. There was something else though. A presence? The studio felt like it used to feel when we went together. I scanned the room, part of me hoping to see you, but another part berating myself for being so hopelessly hopeful. I had a flashback to my dream and I had to sit down. As I did, I felt a hand on my lower back, gently guiding me to the seat but also pulling a bit to turn me around. 

Your eyes were as green I remembered and they still had the same mischievous glint to them. There was something else behind that sparkle though, a deep look of sadness and remorse. I sat. If I hadn’t sat on the chair it would have been the ground. Unlike in my dream, I didn’t freeze and my knees didn’t lock beneath me. I became like water and flowed downwards until the cushioned chair caught me. Your hand moved to my shoulder and your other to my face, urging me to look at you and not the floor. You stayed standing in front of me and gave me a moment to come back to life before offering your hand for a dance. I couldn’t think of anything to do but nod my head in assent. You held your arms open for me and when I fit my frame to yours you held me tight. I’d forgotten how well our bodies fit together, my ribs just below yours, our elbows in contact and your firm hand on my back. We waltzed. I didn’t even realize the parallel between my dream and reality until you began to quietly hum along to the music. So now I come to you, with open arms, nothing to hide, believe what I say. I should have been the one singing along. But you seemed to feel how well the song fit in the moment and you continued to sing, as if telling me that you understood how I had been feeling for the past two years. You were back, you were sorry, and you were mine again. I haven’t danced to that song with anyone else since.

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outsideinanddownsideup:

Our last dance together was a waltz, just as it was before I left for boarding school at age 14 and when I left again, this time for college at age 18. It was a waltz, just like it was in the recurring dreams I had during that awful year you disappeared. It was a waltz, not to the song that I still think of as being “our” song, but to a beautiful, sad, nostalgic song just the same. A waltz that perfectly characterized our relationship and how close, yet careful we are. It was a waltz that ended in a deep, breathtaking dip, followed by a quick snap up with hair in my face and a pop from my neck. If anyone else were to dip me that slowly, I’d be uncomfortable. If anyone else were to purposely snap me back up to “restyle” my hair, I might just slap them. But not with you, never with you. That’s become another one of “our” things, something you do only with me and it’s one of those things that makes me miss you even more. Every time someone dips me I think of you. Every time someone plays with my hair I think of you. Every time someone makes fun of how much my bones creak and crack I think of you. 

My last night in town was only wonderful because of you, just as I’d hoped it would be. You’re always the reason I don’t want to leave, no matter where I am leaving to. But when you ask me why I get sad at the end of my time home, I can’t ever answer you fully. I tell you it’s because I’ll miss the nice weather, my family, a certain number of friends. But it’s really because of you, you’re always the person I miss most. I just can’t ever tell you that. 

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outsideinanddownsideup:

On the way home from my dance lesson, I cried. Not just a few slow tears, but the sobbing, gasping for air, blinking back the blurry tears kind of crying. 

You had called me during my lesson. We’ve been having issues and many more (and much more deeply rooted) issues than you are aware of. I missed your calls and couldn’t get ahold of you because you’re still on the other side of the world. That wasn’t why I was crying though.

I didn’t cry for you. I didn’t cry because of the problems we’ve been having. I didn’t cry because of my fear that we won’t survive much longer. I didn’t cry because I miss you. I could have cried for those reasons. I should have been crying for those reasons. 

No, I cried because of something that had almost nothing to do with you. I cried because, once again, I was just leaving the person who has constantly been there for me when I needed him to be. I was crying because the familiar feeling of abandoning someone I love was returning. I cried because I didn’t want to leave. I cried because he is still, somehow, the only person that makes me happy regardless of how awful my mood previously was. I cried because he always helps me and has my best interests at heart. I cried because I’m lonely and without you, he is the only person that makes life worth living right now. I cried because I love him. Not because I love you. 

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outsideinanddownsideup:

You have always thought I was just a timid, shy girl. You used that knowledge to assume that’s why I don’t talk much, even to you. 

That’s not the reason I don’t talk to you though. I try my best, I really do. Over the past five years, you’ve been one of the only constants in my life and I really want you to be the person I can open up to and talk to about anything. I just can’t talk to you about important things, because you are the important thing. If I told you what I was really thinking my last day of summer before I left for the opposite side of the country, if I told you what I have missed most so far about home, if I told you what my favorite part of this winter break has been, I would be pushing too many boundaries, crossing too many lines. Everything you try to get me to talk about, every question you ask me, the answer is always you.

I was sad because I left you. I missed you most. I’m sad again because I’m leaving you again. You will still be the person I miss most. You have been the best part of my break and my time home revolved around you. 

I love you. I’ll miss you even more than I did the last time. I just wish I could tell you that.

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outsideinanddownsideup:

I can see where the girlfriend versus mother dispute comes from. 

I love my boyfriends mom and sister. I’m even okay with his dad calling me short. I have sat through numerous conversations about how “unfortunate” it is that I’m a vegetarian, how I’m “too thin” etc. and I’m sure that’s nowhere near over. 

I started feeling it this summer when my boyfriend and I were having problems. He spent the entire summer in Thailand while I was stuck at home working every day. I don’t resent him for that and I’m glad he got to revisit his old childhood friends after years apart. 

That said, I’ve begun resenting his parents for the things they convince him to do, especially his guilt-tripping mother. The plan for winter was that he would spend a week in Thailand, a week in India and then spend the rest of break with me. We would still have less than a week together but I was looking forward to it so much. I began planning my entire break around him and what he wanted to do when he came to visit me and my family and everything was going really well until his mother changed her mind. She suggested he spend ten more days not only in Thailand, but meditating without phone or Internet access. He has been complaining to me since then that he doesn’t want to even go to Thailand in the first place, yet he goes along with his mother’s plan without question. 

I get it, family is important and I’m just being a selfish girlfriend, but I really resent her making him stay when it’s obvious that he doesn’t want to and would rather spend the time with me. 

Now I don’t know what to do over break. Maybe I’ll convince my boyfriend (during one of our few, brief conversations) that it’s not that big of a deal to spend a night getting wasted with middle school friends. 

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outsideinanddownsideup:

I’ve been spending too much money. 

I offer to pay for dates and meals with my boyfriend because I know he doesn’t want to pay all the time, but whenever he needs money he just asks for it and his parents add some to his bank account. My money is MY money. I only ever ask my parents for money when it’s school related. They shouldn’t have to pay for my weekend expenses, though I’m sure they’d be happy to help. I feel bad asking them to give me money to buy Christmas presents, to go eat dinner out, to buy myself a hat. But I can’t do this much longer. 

My boyfriend got angry at me the other night because I didn’t offer to pay for at least half of dinner. I didn’t offer because I knew I shouldn’t/couldn’t. I wish I could have, I really do. But I can’t go ask my parents to give me more money when I already know they’re struggling.

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