BUTTERFLIES

EPILOGUE

With each step I took down into the metro, my legs felt heavier. I felt like I was made of lead, and at any second I could fall over, paralyzed. My entire being felt numb, ears ringing and vision blurry as I stood on the escalator down. I had no energy to walk. Until I felt the first drop hit my neck, I hadn't realized I was crying. I moved my hand to wipe my cheek and felt it was slick with tears.

I don't know what Lena did once I walked down the steps that morning. I never looked back, and perhaps she didn't either. Or perhaps she was standing there watching me disappear. Or perhaps she turned around and immediately walked back to her apartment, left just as it was minutes before. Days, weeks, months before. Filled with echoes of our laughter and singing, memories on high volume. But also with the whispers, the late night conversations, the moments of knowing between us and eyes caught looking at one another. The gentle touches here and there, her hand grazes mine, I tuck her hair behind her ear, she traces shapes on my skin, I spin the ring around her finger. In the silence, the quiet feels impossibly loud.

Or perhaps she went and made a coffee, and started her work, and went about her day. Perhaps she was fine. Perhaps she completely broke down. Perhaps this was all a dream.

Or perhaps.

Perhaps I'll never know.

***

Lena always said don't listen to music that you are feeling, because it only makes it worse. But I had to give myself this. This wound was too fresh. The song lyrics that normally felt like salt on broken skin were now comforting. I put in my AirPods to drown out the noise, and the thoughts, and closed my eyes as I waited for my train.

I was only on the train for a couple stops, so I didn't want to risk drifting off for too long. So I watched people. Early morning commuters brought an odd bunch. Teenagers for whom it was still the night before were stumbling in, drunk, barely staying upright when the train started and stopped. A few people off to work. Families with luggage to board their morning flights. It was always dead silent unless the club-goers got rowdy. What do I look like?

I was on autopilot from the second I got off the metro until I boarded the flight. Somehow I made it through security and to the right gate at the right time, though I don't remember any of it. Once I was in my seat, I felt a wave of relief that I could simply sit there, be still and rest. When I closed my eyes, all I could imagine was Lena sitting beside me on the flight. There was no escape from this except time, which of course, I had no control over. Grief is a waiting game.

***

When I landed at my layover, nothing felt real. I had fallen asleep, albeit restlessly, and within the span of a single dream I was across an ocean. Everything felt hazy, the millions of seconds that had passed with Lena felt so condensed now that I wasn't there with her. When I turned off airplane mode, I watched the date change on my screen. A new day felt wrong.

It's our anniversary, I realized. I had been so caught up in my own head that I didn't realize we had already come up on another month. It felt wrong to text her, but also wrong to ignore it. But I shoved my phone into my pocket to push it out of sight, out of mind. Burying it with the rest of my memories, at least for a while, so that I didn't get buried with them.

After the long line of customs, I found my next gate and sunk back into the trance I had been in for the entire day, or night, whatever time had passed. When I finally landed at home and started down the long corridor to baggage claim, I saw my parents standing at the end. The wave from my mom almost made me break down again into tears. I didn't want to run, but my legs were practically giving out beneath me, I felt like I couldn't get to them quick enough.

I fell into her arms and finally felt a brief solace from all the emotions I had been experiencing over the past 24 hours, even the past days and weeks. I knew I couldn't push away the sadness, but I could take a break from it at home. 

When we got to my house, my bedroom felt smaller, younger. In the time I had spent away, I had outgrown this space. The clothes I had left behind still fit, but they felt uncomfortable and wrong. My bed felt small, the ceiling felt low, the yellow on my walls seemed faded. I knew it was only a matter of time before everything felt normal again, but I also knew I was someone different now than the person I was when I left for Denmark in January.

I lay down on my bed and my cat jumped up next to me, nudging my hand with her nose and purring.

"I've missed you," I said to her. She rolled over onto her back to signal her affection.

"What is this life?" I asked her, but really I was asking the sky. I checked my phone, 6:18 pm, which meant it was after midnight in Copenhagen. Goodnight, Lena, I thought. My own bed felt strange without her laying next to me.

It was easier to feel better when I was so removed. But I didn't want to feel better, not yet. I wanted to ache in the sadness, I wanted to feel everything I was feeling, because to feel a sadness this deep meant we had a love even deeper. And to stop feeling sad would mean the door was closing on this season and I wasn't ready to let go. I wanted an eternal summer, and I would stand in the doorway and look back until the winds of winter finally blew everything away, even if it meant the door slammed on my fingertips and left me bleeding.

Maybe that was dangerous, maybe it hurt more than it would have if I had just let go, but I don't regret things.