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I wasn’t ready to leave, and yet I knew everything good had to come to an end. I finally found my place after months of searching; I finally started feeling independent, comfortable, able. I had found plenty of shoulders that would support me without question and hands to pull me up when I fell. But it was all being ripped away for the time being. Next year, it’d come back but in a different form. Because life doesn’t stop for anybody, and people and places change no matter how much you want things to stay the same.

I was past the grieving stage, past feeling sorry for a broken friendship. Now my mind was just trying to simplify things, pack everything into neat boxes, organize thoughts and feelings so that they didn’t pop up at inconvenient times. It wasn’t something I chose; it happened without thought. And while some people thought it was cold, unfeeling, emotionless–it was just another day in my life.

He walks out of the science building, and I know it’s him right away. Hands in his pockets, head bent down. I try not to look, I try to walk past him, but he waves at me, and my sad smile stops me in my tracks. I keep making enemies left and right, it seems because I can’t keep my heart from screwing things up.

Walking past the planter, I saw you walking at me. The sun made my eyes squint, but you were still there, still closing the gap, as my eyes tried not to water from the sun or the fact that you hadn’t talked to me in almost a month. And then you were there, parallel to me, and I knew I had to look at you, so I did. You tried to smile, but it was awkward after what happened. And I tried to smile, but the look on my face only read, “What is there to do?”

I got the text when sitting in the cafe the next day. Coffee aided last night’s debauchery, in case you ever wondered what really happened. I got tipsy with some friends, went back to my room, and only wanted someone to sit with me. I wanted a friend, I wanted someone I knew, but you weren’t there, and you didn’t care why I texted you at one thirty in the morning. And that hurt more than the meaningless fooling around, it hurt more than your self-righteous claims. It meant you didn’t even care about our simple friendship. And to that, I say

fuck you.

I step onto the metro as he stands on the concrete walkway. The big window separates our hands, and our fingers smudge the glass. The train shakes, and I know I’ll be meters away in a second. I hold onto a nearby pole as his figure shrinks behind me. I try to hold it together.

But then it all falls down.

Just hearing his voice again gives my stomach shivers, and I take my time rounding the corner. With us, it was always like geometry. I never understood the angles and the degrees or why it was even important in the first place. And that’s us. I still don’t comprehend why we still get thrown together and why we always screw things up. Maybe I should just give us up like ninth grade me dropping out of accelerated geometry.

She taps on the dashboard with excitement, and we jump out of the beat up rental. The sun’s only just rising out from underneath a rocky hill. Running, running. The hill’s no problem for our young legs. And finally at the top, with grass between our toes, there it is. The most astoundingly beautiful sunrise we’ve ever laid eyes on. I look over at them, my two best friends since the beginning of time. It’s the little things.

But there’s nothing little about that orange globe of flames keeping us warm until we die.

I should have known. I should have remembered from last time. Last time, he consumed my thoughts every waking moment. I wanted to be with him when I wasn’t. I thought we were going to evolve into what I wanted. But we didn’t.

And now his figure lives in my brain every second that I’m not thinking about what I need to do to make it through another day. But I’m not as innocent this time. I’m not as stupid. The conversations weave through my mind like intersecting vines. I don’t want to think about him. But I do. Because I messed up once again, and it hurts like hell all over again.

I stared at the smudge my fingers had left on the train window. Fingers that were saying goodbye to the best friend I ever had. His teeth were so white, smiling at me, waving me off to a new land two thousand miles away.

My teeth were hidden behind a frown that desperately tried to wave off tears. Because I cared so much for him, and I knew it just wasn’t the same on the other side of the tracks.