Just for Now

Journal Entry - 6

My first panic attack was the day of my high school graduation.

Everyone was celebrating, and I couldn't breathe.

The day had started off good. I looked freaking good in that cap and gown. Felt like a real hot shot. I was the first of my siblings to graduate, you know? Felt like I was showing them what was next for them eventually, it felt good.

My Dad even let me have some whiskey and a cigar before the ceremony. God, I was such a tool. I walked around the house and stopped into every room with a person in it. I made sure everyone saw me with a drink in one hand and a cigar in the other. My Mom yelled at me for smoking it in the house, but she didn't tell me to go outside. I think she would've let me get away with anything that day. I was like those people who got a coffee before school and made it annoyingly clear they got a coffee before school.

The ceremony dragged, like always. I almost fell asleep during the speeches. Like, we get it.

Remember your roots.

Never give up.

Follow your dreams.

Or at least that was what the principal said.

Well, I followed my dreams so far that I became an accountant.

How about that, Mr. Breuer?

But then we got back to my house for the celebration and the panic set in.

Because what the fuck was next?

What do you mean I would have to live with some random person I just met in a dorm the size of a shoebox? What the hell do you mean I wouldn't me able to see my family every day or the friends I've known for almost eighteen years?

My only saving grace was that I'd have Alli. Thank god.

But what if I wasn't enough for her? I mean, we were going to college with people from all over the world. What if I wasn't enough for her anymore? What if she found someone better?

I didn't even remember hearing the door open. Suddenly, Alli was just in front of me.

"Hey, hey, what's wrong," Alli asked me, her hands instantly going to hold my face. She knew I liked that. It always calmed me down. She always calmed me down.

"I-I... you won't need me anymore," I told her. God, my voice was pitiful.

She was shaking her head so hard it almost blurred. "Why do you say that?"

"Life keeps changing," I grunted out with a wheeze, hand pressed against my chest. "I can't- I can't keep up, and you won't need me."

"What? Why would you think that?" she had asked me, but I couldn't even generate a response.

I can still feel the dread I felt that day. I was terrified that the invisibly string that had always tethered us together was growing thin with time. That one day it would break apart and she would drift away from me. Or, even worse, if she would be the one to cut the string herself. I couldn't lose her. I just couldn't.

"I want you, Cole, I want you," Alli told me firmly as she turned my face to see her own, emerald eyes full of earnest. "I want you, isn't that enough?"

But I couldn't hear it. "But what if it's not enough some day?"

"Look at me, please," she begged, sinking down to the floor so she'd be below me, giving me no choice but to meet her gaze. "You are the man that I love, that doesn't just go away one day."

"And if it does?"

"Then remind me of this, the day I told you that I won't leave you."

There have been times I wanted to remind her of that day. To be fair, she told me to. But how could I? How would that be fair of me? To say, "Remember when you promised you wouldn't leave me?". That would be a different level of cruel that I never wanted to achieve. But I could sense that feeling of impending doom creeping back in and weighing on my chest. And I wasn't sure how to stop it this time.

Alli always knew how to help, though. She somehow just always knew what I needed.

The night after the graduation, we snuck on the roof.

She told me she thought we could breathe easier up there.

I remember liking that she said "we" because it felt like I wasn't alone with what I was feeling.

To calm me down, she let me ramble to her about the constellations.

My Dad taught me about the stars after I got some surgery as a kid and couldn't do much for a few days. I was pissed and bored because it was summer and my friends were all out doing cool things and I was inside. To keep me entertained, my Dad moved me to the window and would tell me about the stars. He would teach me all the constellations he knew, and when he ran out, he'd learn more to tell me. My Dad would learn all the stories and all the different combinations... anything he could to make me happy.

I always found comfort in the stars after that.

That night, Alli would point a hand up in a random direction and ask me to tell her about that cluster. I'd tell her everything I knew about it. I'd ramble until I couldn't breathe, but at least this time it was for good reason. I'd tell her which stars reminded me of her and she'd laugh. I wasn't even sure what she was laughing at, but I just loved the sound of her laugh. It made me feel good. Like I gave her the sun.

Whenever I'd get worked up again, she'd turn her head in and bury her face in between the crook of my neck and shoulder. She knew I loved to hold her, I always found more comfort in it than being held myself. I'd wrap my arms around her and hold her closer to me, feeling calmed by the warmth of her touch.

We stayed up there until the sun rose the next day and I told her that I loved her.

We had said it before, even as kids. We had been saying it our whole lives.

But this one was different.

It was a promise.

One that I never wanted to break.

She said she loved me too, and it felt like the promise was sealed.

That nothing could break it, like a constellation in the sky.