Here I am at fifteen, hugging one last time a dear person who means so much to me. Memories flood my mind, taking me back to my sixth year. The year I first knew what 'goodbye' was, the same year that made me hate love, block that feeling out and push back every thought of ever falling in love with someone.
The same tears are flowing from my eyes, the same pain in the pitch of my stomach, the same hammer is tearing my heart out and breaking it into pieces, the same sorrow is holding my throat, the same clenched jaw. Everything's the same. Except now I'm even more mature, and I understand better what a goodbye means.
For the second time in my life I feel so empty that nothing nor nobody can replace the hole in my heart.
It is not a breakup, not just a loss. It is the loss of the dearest person to your heart. That's what hurts the most.
Today is the second time I bid farewell to my cousin, one I considered my oldest sister. She was the only one left. I trusted her almost with everything. She trusted me, said I'm an eighteen year-old in a fifteen year-old body. She gave me self confidence at some point, and I gave her the ear and heart to listen to her and welcome her.
Life isn't fair, it makes us attached to people we've missed for so long and just like that it takes them away somehow, whether we like it or not.
Exactly nine years ago, we were at grandma's house, I remember nothing but tears on everyone's faces. I still hear and see everything like it's happening in this exact moment. I was so little, my family's tall figures towered over me. I ran around the house wondering what is happening. I saw suitcases everywhere, both of my closest cousins to me were hugging everyone, my aunt crying on my nana's shoulder. Why? I wondered often. I walked across the living room, past the bathroom, to get to my aunt's room. I saw two suitcases on the floor, a scale next to them and a carry-on by the door. Being the curious lightheaded girl I was, I stood on the scale and giggled at the moving numbers before my eyes. Few seconds later, mom got me off of it so she can weigh the suitcase. Meanwhile, I wasn't interested in watching her so I went off to see my older cousin, the eldest in the family, she was fifteen back then. She hugged me randomly like she used to and told me those exact words:
"I'm gonna miss you my dolly"
I never understood what that meant until later that night. My younger cousin, her sister, was twelve. She was running around asking for a little phrase from everyone so she can remember them. She came in and asked for mine, but I was too shocked. I didn't even know how to write back then, or what to write. I'd just turned six after all. Despite my lack of experience in school, I took the pen and drew two girls with a heart in the middle. That was my only way to assure her that I love her. She hugged me when she saw it and started crying. I cried too. Just because she was crying.
Today, even though I understand that she's back in New Jersey, I did not cry for that. I'm constantly convincing myself that I cried for the same reason I cried nine years ago.
That night was the worst night ever. I stayed up crying for God knows when. It was so hard for me knowing that they left, even though I thought at first America was the town next to ours.
Today, I've come to realise that not just towns but miles, continents, seas and oceans separate us. And something holds my heart, telling me it will be long until I see her next. Though I hope it would be a wrong feeling.
Despite the distance between us, I hope we will always be as close, and there will not be a third goodbye, until our last breaths.
Elxx
