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You swore you wouldn’t keep doing this; it was detrimental to your health, mental and otherwise. There had been nights you’d laid awake until the memories you replayed nearly became images in front of your eyes and you swore the pictures would be burned into your retinas forever. You would obsess over every moment, every second, every word said.
That first time was New Year’s Eve. Seventeen years old and naive as a child, you agreed to go to the party with your best friend. She was beautiful, luminous, everything you aspired to be. Her presence was intoxicating and you never wanted to be far from her. She was the type of girl you’d always hoped to be best friends with. You watched while she flirted with a stranger and as you stared, you felt it growing inside of you, vining its way from your stomach and up your throat until it nearly choked you. You gulped down your beer, willing the alcohol to numb you, but it wasn’t working. So you drank more: a shot, then another, then a couple of red plastic cups filled with some sort of punch that burned its way down and throughout your arms and legs. Relief came in the form of a buzzing numbness which helped, until it didn’t. The clock struck midnight. And suddenly, they weren’t just talking. Her lips were on his and her arms were wrapped around his back and you felt all of it, all the jealousy and pain and anger, pushing its way into your vision and you saw red. You shook your head and threaded your fingers through your hair, tugging until you couldn’t stand the sharp pain in your scalp. It wasn’t enough. The alcohol wasn’t working anymore. Every time you closed your eyes, you saw them together. So, you ran. You ran until your feet ached and your fingers were numb from the biting wind. You ran until your hair became frosted over with ice from the rain and cold. You ran until you couldn’t breathe, until your breath came in heaving pants, until you nearly blacked out, and even then, you kept going. You couldn’t run away from what was in your head but you would be damned if you didn’t try. Suddenly you knew. You knew it as sure as you knew you were alive. You knew she would never be yours and it ached deep in your body with a fierceness that you never knew existed. Your whole world had changed from grayscale to technicolor in a matter of hours and it didn’t matter because you were alone and she was with him and you couldn’t tell anyone. Not Kara. Not your mom. Not her. Definitely not her. No, you locked this one up deep in your chest. Shoved it back where the vines had started growing and decided then and there never to look at another person the way you had looked at her: all glowing skin and pretty eyes and beautiful soul. Never again.
And you didn’t. You kept your word for so many years. You were used to being alone. It wasn’t so bad. You were good company. You went to college. You studied. You prepared for your future. You were a planner and you had it all mapped out.
But you weren’t prepared for her and she took you completely by surprise. First, she asked to borrow your notes after she’d missed class for a week due to illness. Then, she’d asked you to study with her for midterms. You started spending almost every day with her and then you were living together. You loved her laugh. You studied the way she moved her hands as she spoke. You daydreamed about the adventures you went on during the weekends. For a year, you were very nearly each other’s only friends. You’d spend hours talking and laughing on her bed. She’d play with your hair. You’d snuggle and watch movies and talk about everything under the sun. It was everything you didn’t realize you were missing. You had a best friend again. Someone who knew everything about you. Everything except that secret that you forced yourself to ignore, the one that put a pit in your stomach anytime it crept up on you. Sometimes it happened at night, when you lay next to her, imagining doing more than just sleeping. Or when she’d kiss your cheek, you’d daydream how her lips would feel pressed against yours. Those were the thoughts you’d put away. They’d be locked up with the secret you held. But she filled in the empty spaces. In that year, you found happiness, something you finally started to recognize again. That summer, you spent hours with her, laying in the sand at the beach, talking, and at an internship you’d both been given. You had never felt more complete. Summer came and went and then it was autumn again, and you became busy with classes. Your pattern resumed and you found a happy rhythm with her. Then, she brought him to meet you. After meeting in another class, they had started spending time together between classes and after work. You didn’t know how you’d missed the signs but there they were. That rosiness in her cheeks wasn’t from you. Her eyes sparkled but it wasn’t your doing. He made her laugh. He made her smile and it was different. You were no longer the center of her world. You suddenly weren’t sure if you ever had been. But you couldn’t fault her. He was kind and generous and he loved her. It tore you up. You were angry but you also felt something deeper, a despair, and it hurt, way down in your bones. Your chest felt tight every time her phone chimed with another message from him. When you saw them kiss or when he touched her cheek, you thought it would choke you again. The vines were back and had grown with a ferocity and now, this time, they had a vice grip on you and you were sure you would not survive this. But you pressed on, faking a smile, laughing with them, trying to find steadiness again. It wasn’t in your cards. He proposed, she said yes, and the next thing you knew you were throwing rice at her wedding and the tears in your eyes weren’t happy ones. And with every step she took away from you, the vines grew. They covered you, dark and heavy, and you knew you could never see her again. So you didn’t. You ignored her phone calls. You transferred to another program, bio-engineering, so you wouldn’t risk seeing her in class. You moved to a small apartment on the other side of town and holed up and did everything you could to graduate early so you could get out of there, away from the memories that threatened to drown you.
There was a wicked tear in your body where your heart had been and you weren’t sure it would ever close back up. You filled it with everything you could think of. Alcohol took the edge off but the pain always came back with a vengeance. So you found something stronger in a back alley and that, combined with your nightly binge, seemed to make all the difference. You could forget for a few hours, until you fell asleep and succumbed to the nightmares that plagued you. They were almost always the same and they always left you with an overwhelming sense of aloneness. You craved comfort but you didn’t trust yourself to get close to anyone. Your family worried about you. Kara called you constantly and your mother tried to come see you but you wouldn’t let them near you. No. You were better off alone. Why didn’t you remember that? You scolded yourself, berated yourself. In your weakest moments, you had scraped reminders onto your legs. Not enough to scar but enough to hurt, and with the pain you remembered the deeper agony you’d put yourself through. No one was worth that misery. Not for friendship. Not for anything. You moved blindly, apathetic and angry, in and out of bars and dark alleys and darker lonely moments. It was a blur of misery that was hard to step away from and you weren’t sure you wanted to. Around and around you went until it all caught up with you and you found yourself tossed, unceremoniously, into a dingy jail cell to “sleep it off,” as if that were somehow possible.
Hank scraped you off that jail cell bench, gave you a second chance, and somehow you’d found purpose again. Only this time, it wasn’t in another person. It was in a job, a calling. You were good at what you did and you actually enjoyed it. It was easy to get swept up in it and even easier to use it as a front when it came to spending time with family. When you said you were busy now, it wasn’t a lie. And after a while, you tried on a social life. It never went anywhere. But you supposed you just hadn’t met the right guy yet. Or maybe there just wasn’t anyone for you. Either way, you had work to keep you busy and that was enough to keep the vines at bay. It felt like enough. You prayed it would be enough.
When she showed up, you were so far away from looking for love it was funny. She was funny, thoughtful. She cared about you, even when you were nothing more than acquaintances. You wanted to be better than you were when she was around. She listened when you talked and it was foreign to have someone so invested. And it terrified you. Because if she was invested, you were invested. That was how it had always been, how it had to be. You had sworn you wouldn’t do this. You had looked at yourself in the mirror, red-rimmed eyes and perpetually downturned lips, and swore that you would never do it again. But she changed all of that. Her beautiful smile and her kind eyes and her no-nonsense attitude and her sense of humor and how great she was at her job and how good she was to people. She was more than your heart could take. And when she asked you if you were gay, you balked. You denied it, of course. But inside your heart broke open and all the pain you’d forced away came pouring out at once. It was what you had boxed up neatly and shoved in the darkest corner of your soul. And it was too much now to be put back in that box. The vines threatened you, pushed their way into your every thought and you wanted them to be gone. Then she told you that you deserved to be happy and you clutched those words, held them to your tattered heart, felt them ease into the cracks of your soul, and burrow themselves in your brain and suddenly, you weren’t choking. You could breathe. For the first time, in a long time, your lungs filled with oxygen and your hands came unclenched and you wanted to laugh out loud for the aching freedom you felt.
Terrified as you were, you told her. She was it. You wanted to be with her. You knew, down to the tips of your toes, that you wanted this. It was new and it was different and it was somehow familiar and you couldn’t contain yourself. Your hands were on her cheeks and you were kissing her, kissing her, kissing her. It was like waking up, like watching sunlight dissipate the fog around you. It felt like seconds and it felt like years. You were breathless with excitement and terrified and you wanted to laugh and cry at the same time. Nothing went according to plan for you, however, and as quickly as they’d left, the vines returned. Her words, her explanation for why she couldn’t be with you fed them, and they nearly collapsed your lungs with the weight of them.
Maggie. Her name sent a thrill of fear through you. No, not fear. Something better, nicer, gentler but that produced the same urge, the urge to run. Hope. Acceptance. Steadiness. Love. Love was scary. Love made you fearful, made your feet ache and your soul itch to move. You wanted to sprint as far away as you could. You were convinced for so long that there was no happy ending for you. But, you could not bring yourself to bolt. Because the wind had shifted. Maggie had changed her mind and now you were together. And you were petrified. Every wrong move made you feel like this, antsy and restless, as if this would all come crashing down at once. And it nearly did. Kara went missing and you couldn’t focus on a relationship and helping her and so you did the same thing you always did when it came to taking care of yourself and taking care of your sister - you picked Kara. Sacrificed what small chance you had at happiness and ran, far away. Why risk it all again?
Only this time, when your feet slowed down and your breathing calmed and you finally turned back toward what you ran away from, she was still there.
Maggie told you that you did things together. That is how this worked. Always together, including healing the scars that had plagued you for so long. She hugged you and kissed you and the vines stayed away and your breathing stayed steady and, somehow, the tear that had been there for so long started to close up. It was different but it was good. You were finally coming back together where you’d torn yourself up at the seams.