The Book I Should Have Never Had to Write

February 19, 2017

  But now I'll go sit on the floor
Wearing your clothes
All that I know is
I don't know how to be something you miss  

-Taylor Swift

A year ago today I met the boy who broke my heart. No, correction. I met a boy who broke my heart. There were boys before him, and there'll be boys after him, I'm sure. But there'll never be anyone like him. Don't let that get to your head, Harry. Maybe I'm just saying that no single person is like another. To be honest? I don't know what I'm saying, I don't know if you were special, or if you're only special because you were the first boy I loved so hard I lost myself. What I do know is that after you I couldn't cry for months, and that even today, a year later, my heart feels numb to the point that I haven't been attracted to any other guy since you. I guess you really did ruin me for other guys, in more ways than one.

It's funny how things always seem to tie together when it comes to you. One of my favorite memories of you is from the day of the semi-formal dance last year. We had been texting, but then I had to leave for the dance, but all night while I was shaking my ass to Usher and stuffing too many brownies in my face, you kept popping up in my head as the odd guy who had messaged me online with a math question, who for some reason I couldn't get out of my head. That was exactly one year ago, today. I didn't know then you were going to break my heart, but I guess even if I did I wouldn't have changed a thing.

Breaking a heart is a funny thing...you blame others for when they break yours, but you break some too. It's as if we're all playing a game of hot potato, and we catch some of them but we drop others, but others drop the potatoes we toss to them too.

At semi this year, a guy asked me to dance. He was perfect, in every way. Blonde hair, blue eyes, six pack, kind as hell and singing along to our slow dance adorably off-key. He's been texting me since, sweet good mornings and words of how great he thinks I am, how I inspire him. He's asked me out twice, and I almost said yes, I almost did....but that wouldn't be fair, would it? Because in all his perfection all I can see is imperfection, how his perfectly styled blonde hair should be shaggy and brown and how his perfect blue eyes should be mud-colored and his perfect six pack should be ribs poking out of a too-skinny chest. Today I told him I couldn't like him back like he wanted me to, and I told him about you, because you're the reason why I can't tell how I feel about anyone anymore. I was honest because I promised myself I would never keep someone guessing why, why the other person doesn't care about them like they thought they did, because although my honesty broke his heart today, me telling him why also gave him the glue that one day he can use to mend the fragments I left his heart in. That's more than you did, isn't it?

This isn't going to be edited. That's hard for me, because I'm one of those authors who reads their work over and over and edits every period and every exclamation point until they could probably recite off all their works by rote. But you know something? Something that I've realized is that in doing that, I lose all the emotion of what I write. Perhaps not for other people, but when I read my own work over, I forget how the piece felt when I wrote it. I can't let that happen this time, because I'm not writing this piece for anyone. I'm writing this for me, so that one day I can read this back, when you're just a distant memory, and have a time capsule back to how I feel now. That's what words are, aren't they? Just a time capsule.

This isn't going to be a perfect little story, but since when is anything worth reading perfect? What I felt for you wasn't perfect, so neither is this. It's a mixture of loose ends and what if's and imagined futures and internal screams for me to "JUST GET OVER HIM ALREADY." It's jumbled up feelings and so many questions that I feel like I'm slamming the button to go up in an elevator that's only been programmed to go down.

I don't know where to begin this story. I've been putting it off for so long in fear of it hurting too much, but I think I've realized that writing this will never not hurt. After all, this is the book I should have never had to write, of everything that happened to me, everything that didn't, and everything that now never will.

<3 <3 <3 <3 <3

Heartbreak hurts. Stick with me and maybe we can get through it together.

<3 Phoenix 

Stay happy, love each other, and be strong.