Infinity
× × ×
an epilogue-of-sorts
•First Love : a prose by Deborah Anne Barclay•
First loves are truly something. It doesn't matter how long it has been since we learnt to let go, doesn't matter if we've found someone else, doesn't matter if this someone else is the light of our life and we are so in love with them than we've ever been during all our years — there will always, always be a part of us, piece of our heart that comes back to our first love.
First loves aren't just first loves, are they? They're also that ever and ever love. Not a forever kind, but something along the lines of infinity nonetheless.
I know how this story ends, I've known it since the day I felt my heart skip a beat for him. I just forgot how it began—having lost bits and pieces to my subconsciousness. And it is nice, to have this story documented in something eternal as words.
I have stayed up late at night, questioning what it was about Daniel that kept tugging my heartstrings back to him, what it was that made me want to hold on and never let go—and I have come to a conclusion.
Or, at least, a series of conclusions. There are bits and pieces of so many theories and ideas. A cluster of thoughts; little stars of realisations connecting with each other and making up this constellation of undying light.
I guess, in a way, my first love—Daniel—is the only one who will truly have received all of me, every single raw and unblemished piece. That is something no future lover of mine can ever get, not really, not when I think deep about it. Those raw pieces hold an innocence I once carried in my heart, in my soul, in my eyes. The hope that I can spend my forever with my first love, the belief that he is the one and there can be no other, the faith that love only ever happens once in this life and it will last forever and ever. The blind trust in the fact that we only love once.
The thing is, we don't love just once. We can love a second, and a third. But we just never fall in love the same way again—that happens only once. And First Loves, they are always a once-in-a-lifetime kind of thing. I will never fall for someone the way I fell for Daniel, true, but I will fall in love again. I know that.
Daniel didn't break my heart; he didn't rip away my faith in love. If anything, he taught me that love can set me free, if only I can be brave enough to let it all the way in.
A First Love holds our childhood, our youth, the tenderness of our heart before it learns bitter truths, the carefree light in our eyes before wearniess begins to accompany it. It holds all our first ideas about what love is supposed to be like—all the ideas that our First Love eventually proves wrong and tosses out of our hearts.
And that right there is the simple and most painful truth.
I will never love anyone as deeply, as irrevocably, and as intensely as I did my First Love, and neither will I feel as heart-wrenching a pain as my first heartbreak. So agonising, in fact, that I remember spending nearly every waking moment after acknowledging my feelings wondering why I ever fell in love at all.
There were times when my fists would clench from the pain and I'd want to pound it against the left half of my chest—but our hearts have been bruised enough, and if not for us, who else is going to take care of it? More so, where is the logic in punishing the heart for something way beyond its control?
It's love. It's love. It's love, and it doesn't come with reason.
I was in love with Daniel years after not seeing him, or having any interaction with him whatsoever, without knowing what he even looks like since the last time I saw him — but that's the way love works, I suppose. Such a boundless emotion does not leave just because the person does. We either love them in a way that creates a small infinity in our world, or we never loved them right to begin with.
And maybe years from now, I will have a little girl of my own. And I'll watch her grow up into a young woman, and she might come to me one night with tear-stained cheeks and puffy eyes, her very first heartbreak on her lips and in every sob that shakes her body.
Or maybe I will have a little boy instead, and I'll find him when he's sixteen and heartbroken, with his hair dishevelled because his hands are trembling and all he knows to do is run them through his locks. Maybe I'll find him curled up on the sofa, eyes blank and hopeless.
And this is what I will tell him or her:
Letting go is never easy, not when you loved them with every fibre of your being. First, you will want to hold on.
You will want to hold on with everything in you, with all the strength in the world you can muster, because you already know the ending and the most you are capable of doing is prolonging the inevitable, forcing time to stay still and the world to stop spinning on its axis.
But the world will continue spinning, the sun will keep rising, and the sun will keep setting, and time will go on, and on, and on. Life will pass you by without mercy, not waiting for you to catch your breath and pick yourself up.
You'll go to sleep with a heavy heart and a troubled mind, wondering if you are making the right choice in letting go—because, oh my god, what if you're giving up too soon? What if, if only, but this, but that... Oh those will find their way inside your head and build nests in every hesitant corner of it, taking advantage of all that love floating around with no destination inside you.
You'll wake up with lifeless eyes and a listless body, limbs heavy with exhaustion, and a soul drained of energy.
You'll go to sleep with their name on your tongue and wake up with their image before your eyes.
You'll go to school and seeing someone with a football jersey might remind you of their love for the sport, or you'll be at the ice cream place downtown and a flavour you detest but they love will make your throat tighten, or you'll be at work and a song plays on the radio and your heart will break a little more because that is their favourite song and every word reminds you of their smile.
The first week is hard. The second week, hardest. The third will be unbearable. And the fourth will have you cursing love.
And then one day you'll wake up with a heavy heart and wonder if you're going to take a body wash or shower your hair too. And suddenly, you'll remember that they always used a particular brand of shampoo and conditioner, and there your heart will go breaking again.
Few days later, you will wake up and stay still for a few more moments in bed, wondering if you want to take a body wash or shower your hair too. And then, you'll ask yourself if you want to have something sweet like pancakes for breakfast or something traditional like a grilled cheese and ham sandwich. You will recall how they loved a certain type of cuisine and there will be this hollow feeling in your chest and your hands will start trembling that all you can do is stand there, not knowing what to do.
But do you see?
Do you see?
They are no longer the first thing you think about when you open your eyes in the morning and are about to begin your brand new day.
That's how you progress; baby steps. Little by little. Steps so tiny, so small, you don't even know they're being taken.
You will one day wake up and wonder what you want to have for breakfast, and somewhere during noon, you'll have a breakdown.
Weeks later, you'll wake up and wonder what you want for breakfast, if you have any pending homework or chores that needed completing, and somewhere in the evening, you'll have a breakdown.
Months later, you'll wake up and wonder what you want for breakfast, your mind running through your to-do list for the day, and if you want to buy that pair of shoes you saw at the mall last week, and somewhere in the night, you'll have a breakdown.
Another month later, you'll wake up and wonder what you want for breakfast, have a mental run-through of your checklist for the day, decide if you want to hang out with some of your friends or drive somewhere all by yourself, and you'll have a nice time whatever option you go with—and you won't have a breakdown, but you might have one the very next day. Or maybe two days later instead.
But your heart breaks a lot less frequently now, the sadness no longer hitting you on a daily basis.
And that, that is how you will move on. Without even realising you're doing it. Because you're not supposed to be waiting to move on—you shouldn't be longing for it.
You are supposed to take your time and lose yourself to the pain, to deal with all the sorrow and yearning. Sometimes, to be in love is the loneliest place you can be in, but do so anyway.
You've got to break and hit rock bottom before rising up from those very shards.
And after I've told them these words, it might still not mean much. Because when we're in emotional pain, sometimes words only float in and right back out of our heads. And that is okay.
I just hope, that when someone with a broken heart reads this, they know they're not alone in that lonely place.
First Loves are a great thing, they are. But they aren't the beginning and the end of love.
Daniel was my first love, my ever and ever love. Perhaps, he is also the love of my life.
But he is not my last love. And the world is too full of that one spectacular and endless emotion for me to give up on the idea of it altogether.
Daniel Harrington may never read this, but on the highly unlikely chance that he does—
thank you.
× × ×
i'm an emotional mess.
thank you so much for reading this story when i know its narrative style was very different and kind of unusual too. and also because it was packed with emotion, but you stuck till the end anyway.
if you're interested in reading any of my future works, The Way We Almost Were is my next project and I've posted the blurb + aesthetics, and will be updating the 1st chapter within this week... So, you can always check that out. No pressure though, ONLY IF you're interested. ❤
Thank you for reading; y'all never fail to amaze me with your support :')