I can move mountains
I can work a miracle, work a miracle
I'll keep you like an oath
"May nothing but death do us part..."
~"Uma Thurman", Fall Out Boy
I was accepted to MIT, in the US. I'd always been a conscientious student, so the letter came as a pleasant surprise but not a shock.
I moved that June. It had always been my ambition to be an executive working in the offices of some famous technological company, like Google, or Microsoft. I was a hundred percent determined to be focused and committed. Nothing could distract me. I would excel in university, get noticed by professors and lecturers, and have at least five recommendations from the teachers to important companies.
But of course, it didn't happen that way.
Life never goes the way it's supposed to.
...
My first day was just fine. Students milled around, chatting. I was talking to another girl from my design class, leaning against my locker. We were both genuinely interested in the conversation. Then she waved goodbye and left for a talk. I waved back and turned to place a neatly-stacked pile of books in my locker.
And then.
And then.
There was a hand on my shoulder.
There was a breath in my ear.
I dared not move.
I dared not breathe.
And then, in that moment, I knew.
You said my name. Just like you did that horrible night, just like you did so many years ago, the era of our relationship, when everything was perfect. A lifetime ago.
You said my name, and I turned towards your voice.
Yes.
It's me.
...
You begged for an entire week. Asking, pleading for just one date, just one night, just one kiss. I was resolute; I refused. You really thought I was that stupid? A glass heart knows not to sit at the edge of a shelf. And that's what you were, essentially: our relationship was a precipice, and I was a single centimetre from falling off.
Then one night, I came back to the student hostel to find a bouquet of roses on my doorstep. With it was a card. On the card was two words.
I'm sorry.
Maybe it was the repetition of apologies, maybe it was the little sleep I had gotten that day. Whatever it was, my resistance crumbled. So you really were sincere, then? You wouldn't lead me off the cliff again?
Fine.
I called you and said one word.
Okay.
...
We fell back into the same, steady rhythm as before. Only it wasn't entirely the same. The first night we talked and talked and talked for hours, catching up on the other's life. It was strange thinking that the places you had been and the people you had met and the memories you had made didn't involve me. So we talked.
