Damage

Chapter 1

When I was a little girl, I never thought that I’d be leaving my hometown – for good.  Of course, I would probably go off to college, but there wasn’t a part of me that thought I wouldn’t be coming back.  Now, I’m sure I won’t be.

Maybe it’s the fact that I was fast asleep just before we began to take off, but as I look down at the city from a thousand feet up in the sky, all the lights look a little brighter than they usually do.  I rest my head against the cold, plastic window of this plane and shut my eyes tightly before opening them again.

Breathe in.

I look down at the carry-on beside my feet and the cards that rest in my lap, my fingers toying with the bent-over edges and tracing along the now-smudged lines that spell out "Have fun at college!" and “I’ll miss you, Mia!” and  “I love you’s” that sound more like apologies each time I read them.

 Breathe out.

I lean back against the window and look down at the streets that look more alive in the dark and for a second, I never want to leave. But I know that I will, that I have to.

There are too many bad memories here and even though it’s been years since it happened; I feel like the memory of him is still wrapped around my neck, choking me and stopping me from breathing.

“How many have you smoked today?” I asked, smelling the sweet burnt smell still lingering on his skin and his fingertips as he lit another one. 

“Two packs,” he said, looking down at the young girl beside him in the backyard of the home I grew up in. “Do you know what that means?”

“No.” 

“It means that I’m going to die someday.”

He looked straight ahead into the distance, his jawline defined against the long column of his neck that disappeared into the soft flannel of his plaid shirt, rolled up at the elbows.

"But, aren't we all going to die someday?" I asked.

He smiled and turned to me, resting his fingers underneath my chin, and watching my eyelashes flutter as I blinked up at him, my brown eyes catching his like they always had and always would.

"You won't." 

And I believed him. 

But now as I fly past the city I grew up in and feel a sinking, sad feeling in my chest, my breaths become quicker and quicker and I can feel the tears start to fall. I've never felt so sad or so alone, and it feels like dying, the walls of this plane beginning to cave in and little droplets falling down my cheeks and dropping onto the good-bye cards, wetting the ink and blurring out parts of the messages forever. 

It'll be okay.

And I know that it will be. I'll meet new people and new friends at college. New York is the perfect place to lose yourself and start over, to let go of the bad memories and move on with my life. I wipe my fingers underneath my eyelids and after a few seconds, the tears stop coming and I can breathe again. 

It'll be okay. 

***

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