Self Help

Misery doesn't love company

After that final conversation Aidan dropped out of my life like the bottom of a wet paper bag. My life had been seamlessly ripped apart, leaving a gaping whole in the center of me.

Everything I'd worked towards, the future that we'd dreamed about, everything was gone.

I got a huge box from my basement and packed the last year and a half of my life into it. Countless letters and drawings. The photos of us smiling that I'd looked at every day in my dorm room. The roses from that first Valentine's day I'd so carefully dried. My corsage from prom. The pearl bracelet his mother had given me when I graduated.  The citrine promise ring I'd worn every day since the summer before I left for school. "I promise I'll be here waiting" he'd said.

I shut it all away, I couldn't bear to look at it. I grabbed a roll of duct tape and wrapped the box tightly so that no one could get in - and none of the memories could come seeping out.

"DO NOT OPEN UNTIL 2011" I scrawled on the side of the box in big letters. I wasn't sure how long it would take until I'd be able to look at any of these things, but three years seemed like a good guess.

So I stowed away our relationship and tried my best to put one foot forward. I would cry silently as I washed colour bowls in the sink at my salon job, sniffling quietly and trying not to be noticed. I lost hours staring into space, re-playing everything that had happened, desperately trying to find where I'd went wrong so I could go back and fix it.

The days dragged on and I prayed I would hear from him. Then finally, on the day of Andrea's University graduation, a single text.

"I miss you."

I wanted to tell him everything, to beg him to take me back. But instead, I wrote the same three words. Minutes felt like hours as I waited for his reply. We made polite small talk and he asked if he could come by soon to pick up the things he'd left at my house. I knew I shouldn't read anything into the situtation, or expect anything to happen, but of course I did the exact opposite. I felt sick to my stomach with anticipation.

This was my last chance to change Aidan's mind.

As luck would have it, my parents were out of town when Aidan decided to stop by. I primped nervously before his arrival, trying to look casual but pretty. When he finally came over, we stood awkwardly in the kitchen and looked at the floor while we talked like strangers about the weather. Everything about it felt wrong. All I wanted to do was feel his arms around me, to breathe in that familiar smell. I wanted to feel him kiss my forehead, to close my eyes and hear him tell me it was all a bad dream.

Aidan followed like a puppy up the stairs and into my bedroom. I'd assembled all of his things on the bed. The last evidence that we'd ever meant anything to each other. When he looked at the pile, a tear slid slowly down his cheek. Instinctually I reached for him and wiped the tear away with my thumb. He grabbed my wrist and pulled me close to him.

"I love you," he breathed.

"I love you too," I said.

Without another word he kissed me.  I couldn't believe it. Maybe this had all been a big misunderstanding. After all, we were better together weren't we? Wasn't I still everything to him that he'd once promised?

We tangled into each other's arms, and it was as if nothing had ever happened.

Eventually we had to come back to reality. I turned to Aidan, propped up on one elbow.

"I guess I should get my stuff," was all he said. I hastily got up and filled my arms with the artifacts of our relationship, and helped him walk them outside. When we reached my front door, he stopped and turned back to face me.

Shyly, I asked him when I would get to see him again.

"When I said I loved you back there, I meant as a friend, you know?".

Even as he said this, his eyes couldn't meet mine. Of course I didn't know that. And we both knew what I'd meant.

I was devastated. "How can you just turn your back on us?" I pressed him.

"Wasn't what we had worth saving? Isn't there any part of you that still loves me?"

Aidan turned away from me again. "I'm just miserable, and I want to be miserable by myself." He choked out, blinking hard to keep back tears.

With that he turned and walked away from me. He got in his car and drove away without a second glance back.

I stood there in shock, letting the tears roll down my raspberry sun dress.