Fifteen | ✓

Christopher's flight was scheduled on a Friday night in the first week of September.

He had invited her to escort him to the airport and to the departure terminal, but she declined. She wasn't sure if she would be able to suffer through any more emotional strain.

Catherine was becoming sadder and sadder each day, skipping meals and sleeping too much, dark rings taking formation around her eyes.

Fen was worried at first, prodding her with questions and eyeing her 24/7. Especially when she ate only a quarter of the curry rice her mother had prepared on Tuesday. Curry rice was her favourite.

Eventually, he gave up, giving her the space and time she needed until she would eventually open up. She was fond of distancing herself whenever she was down.

Her mother had suspicions too, but dismissed it as a fever after she felt Catherine's burning neck. The tablets she purchased from the pharmacy were hidden and forgotten underneath Catherine's pillow.

She was coping, or at least trying to cope. There was so much one could do when it felt like a gaping hole had been placed where their heart was supposed to be. She didn't feel pain anymore. She had run out of tears; her system seemed to have lost its ability to manufacture more.

She was just empty.

That is, until that Friday rolled around, and she sensed every brick wall she had meticulously constructed tumbling down and onto her back.

Her room was bolted shut and she had put on an old Green Day album to play loudly on repeat.

She moved mindlessly around the space of her room, staring at the picture she'd drawn of him and the photo she'd snapped last week with his hair peeking in the corner. Hot tears started to stream her face again, involuntarily.

Christopher's flight was to be at 10:00 pm, and she imagined him with his traveling box, waiting at the terminal and looking for her, wondering if she would come 

And then she imagined him not waiting at all, him feeling ecstatic to rid himself of such a nuisance, and she shook her head to unclog her mind.

At the time of his departure, she stationed herself at her bedroom window, looking up to the velvet sky and counting the stars.

"Let's make a wish," she remembered Christopher say weeks ago.

It turned out that wishes didn't come true.

An airplane soon invaded the peacefulness of the night, it's blinking red lights contrasting the pallid colours of the heavenly bodies.

"Is that Christopher's plane?" she asked herself, pulling out her phone to capture a picture of it. Afterwards she deleted it, shutting close her windows and drawing her curtains.

She had begged him not to leave, but what she hadn't known was that he was never hers to begin with.

The next day, she woke with a sense of renewed hope, already longing to see him again.

Maybe he hadn't left. This happens in the movies all the time. Maybe he changed his mind and he is waiting for me.

She visited the street that they first met, the Mc Donald's branch downtown, the mall, the park they had shared their first kiss in, his apartment, Walmart, and even the lake.

But no, he was not there.

People are temporary.... Everything has to come to an end.... What do you know about love, Catherine?

She tried with all her might to hate Christopher, but she couldn't. She just couldn't bring herself to.

And yes, he was right, she had continued to survive without him in her life, although with a throbbing, aching heart.

And it had continued to ache for days, weeks, and months on end....

Until it didn't.