"I miss you."
All the lights shut, Dillon unlocked his mobile phone to send a text. Sleep doesn't come easily for him, not for a long while, not after his emotional destruction. So 4AM thoughts take over making him give to his weakness and vulnerability. It's been a month since they split up and everything seems to slow down but also swallowed by waves of haziness and confusion. It doesn't make sense, especially when everything he knew had to change all of a sudden. "It's unfair, it's an injustice, that it almost makes sense," he thought, because the universe is naturally chaotic; entropy makes the world go round. Or perhaps he just learned to accept it and refused to make sense of it.
Two months ago Dillon was in ecstasy, intoxicated with happiness and bliss. Colors seem sharper and brighter, positivity bounces spontaneously from person to person, breeze feels cooler and more relaxing, everything has a degree of clarity to it without a hint of fog, and most of all sleep comes naturally as an apple falling from its tree due to gravity. Needless to say, everything is logical. This is important to him because he doesn't believe anything that is illogical or inconceivable. If he can't explain it, it doesn't exist, except for love. He realized before his emotional distraught that like his heart break, love is something so confusing and illogical that it somehow makes sense, that love is something beyond comprehension. And the more he tried to understand it to enlighten his point of view, an image of her always appeared in the back of his mind. She was love.
But a month ago the world turned grey, shades darker, gloomier, sadder than the other. It was the night when Dillon decided to pick her up from work to set up a romantic evening for the two of them. He didn't know exactly, but he felt that their relationship is going downhill. Perhaps slowly, but unfortunately, surely. He knew he could save it. Two years invested in this relationship he was so certain that couples have a rollercoaster ride-like patterns: some are down and some are up. Little did he know that night the rollercoaster tracks broke, split in half, crashing down with him at the front row.
"Hey, look, we need to talk," she started, a little after the usual hello's and how are you's.
"Yeah," Dillon said "but can it wait? I was thinking maybe we could go to a nice restaurant, we haven't done that in a while."
"Oh, it's okay, my coworker brought some homemade to work," she said. He wasn't sure, but every evidence points to her tone that suggests distant and cold. Then again he wasn't the emotion expert, not him, not ever. "He's been going to culinary school for a while now and been practicing a lot." she added.
"Eric, right? That's so cool," he replied, not knowing what to say. "So, what do you want to do tonight? It's the weekend and we just got paid. I was thinking something fun," He didn't really have anything in mind.
"I'm actually really tired, Dil, do you mind just dropping me off? I still have to tell you something though."
"Right, of course." The conversation abruptly.
The tension rises as silence took over the entire car ride to her house. It has been a long time since Dillon described any type of silence between them as awkward. But he knew she never really liked to talk about something mind-involving in the car especially when he is driving. So he waited restlessly until he parked right in front of her house.
"Are you breaking up with me?" Dillon asked, anxious, to know what the answer was. She started with the most cliche line before a break up, based on what he's read and what he's seen.
She only nodded. She stared at the ground, seemingly afraid to look up and back at him. It took her a couple of minutes to say something. "It's just -- "
"Why?" He interjected. It was right to ask, or so he felt. Logically, no. At this point feeling and logic don't mix with each other, he concluded.
"I'm not sure, really," she explained "it's just not the same anymore, you know?" she looks to her left while she wipes her welling tears under her eyes.
"Of course it's not. Everything is changing everytime. Even the universe is expanding faster when we thought it should be slowing down. And why in the hell would you want to stay the same?" He couldn't make sense of what was happening, but he felt deep anger inside him, something he never thought he'd feel before.
"I know you wouldn't understand," she answered. "You're not like me, Dil, you never were and never will be."
"What the hell is that supposed to mean?" he said.
"It means what it means! I understand you, but you don't understand me! You have this intense comprehension of theoretical physics and quantum mechanics, but with basic human understanding, not a drop!"
She took the words out of Dillon's head, it seemed. He knew he was different from other people, but he thought that if there was anyone who would and could understand him, it was her. But it never occured to him that maybe she's right. He doesn't truly understand her, but he knows he tries. His anger turns to guilt, or whatever it is. Only thing he knows for sure is that there is a pool of bad emotions flowing inside him.
"So what does this mean?" Dillon asked.
"It means we're through, Dillon, that we're not to see each other again. Completely."
"Oh. Okay, I guess that's it, huh?"
"Yes. Good night, Dillon."
"And to you."
She turned around and walked towards her door while Dillon headed back towards his car. He turned around back to her midway to his car, quite certain that he heard her say or mumble something. But she never looked back at him. He opened his car door and stepped inside the vehicle, but couldn't make himself put his car key to the ignition. Something unworldy was weighing him down and he couldn't move. Or subconsciosly he didn't want to be farther away from her than he already is, physically and emotionally. He never understood why he didn't leave and just stayed for hours inside the car, all he knows is that he couldn't.
Emotional understanding has always escaped Dillon. Yes, he feels it. Yes, he's aware of it, but the explanation behind all these feelings eluded him. It's incomprehensible for most people, but most especially to him. His greatest concern was that his brain, being part of the physical world, will never truly and completely understand the universe (physical world) because it is, much like everything else in this universe, is bound by the physical laws of physics. Instead, his emotions became his greatest downfall. And that night a month ago became the starting point in which his emotional snowball began to roll downhill, getting bigger everyday and never stopping. And then he finally gave in tonight, a month later from the break up.
4:07AM, he reads it again and strongly hoping, almost praying, for a reply:
"I miss you."
