Hessa.

Chapter 34

I stayed with her for roughly 6 months but then she told me I had to leave because she didn't want to hold me back. I knew she was right so I put myself in debt to provide her with a carer. By then I was suffering from depression and anxiety at the possibility that hardin was dead. The guilt consumed me because I knew he was gone because of me. Suicide was a daily thought but I could never bring myself to do it. Something about taking my own life to stop my own internal pain seemed selfish. I would be causing pain to all those that I loved while doing so. Im snapped out of my thoughts by the sound of knocking at my door.

"Tess?" My mother walks in and sits next to me on the bed.

"Im sorry I yelled." I apolagize.

"I have something for you." She gets off the bed and kneels down on the floor pulling a box out from under my bed.

"Whats this?" She hands me the box and I put it down next to me. It feels quite light but there is definitely something in there.

"Just open it." I take the lid off the box and I immediately want to cry.

"You kept them all" I swallow back the lump in my throat. Inside lay my charm bracelet,the letter that he wrote so many years ago all taped up,my religion journal,photos of me and hardin and my kindle.

"I thought you threw it all away?" When I had left i got all my stuff including sentimental value and brought it with me. Then I decided to move on from my past and wanted to throw it all away but I couldn't do it. It physically pained me to think about throwing any of these things in the trash but I was determined to forget about him so I told my mom to do it while I was out. When I came home the box was gone and the trash had been emptied. I cried myself to sleep. I wanted it all back. I wanted to read the letter again and put the bracelet back on but I was under the impression it was on its way to some dump site to be forgotten. My religion journal had more value to hardin than me and I saw it as a way of getting back at him. Destroying something that he cherished so much from the very early days of our...whatever it was.
I liked to read it because it reminded me of how much I loved him back in college. I was so confused by my feelings and too stubborn to admit them but hardin was also too much of an asshole for me to even picture what a relationship would look like between us.

"Oh I was ready to erase him from your life. I was standing next to the trash but I couldn't do it. For some reason I always had this gut feeling that you two would end up together for the rest of your lives regardless of wether I approved of him or not." I sit in silence for a few seconds looking at the objects in front of me. I pick up the bracelet and put it back on my wrist. I cant help but smile at having it back on my wrist.

"Tess tell me after all of these years since you two met and all the years that you weren't together did you ever feel the same amount of passion for someone as you do with hardin?"

"No. Not even close and I tried really fucking hard to fall in love with someone else. I didnt care who as long as it wasnt Hardin but I kept comparing it to how I felt with him because I knew that's what love felt like." The amount of dates I went on was ridiculous. I knew within the first 5 minutes of meeting them if it was going to turn into anything but then I had to endure an hour long dinner of small talk. When I first met hardin he intrigued me and made my stomach turn with nervousness. Even making eye contact with him would make me fall into some kind of trance. It scared me how willing I was to trust him.

"Has Hardin?"

"Not that I know of. He wasnt with anyone in California. He said it made him sick to think about." I find myself moving my finger over hardin's face on the photo of us dancing at Karen and Kens wedding. I remember getting the photo as a gift from Landon that he found when looking through the photographers pictures. It was my favourite photo of us. He was looking at me with so much intensity and adoration.