Agape

Prologue

Eleven Hours. Eleven Hours until I arrive in a completely different country that I never even thought of going to or even cared to go to. It took a lot of convincing from my Professor because he really wanted me to go. He said it would be one of the best experiences in my life and that he needed more people to join. I didn't want to go to Greece. As spoiled as that sounds as a mexican american, I just never cared to go to Greece. I wanted to study abroad in England. Growing up, I was obsessed with One Direction and reading fanfics about them. I wanted to go to a place where I could hear british men talking in their attractive accents. My plan was to study abroad for a semester in England. Right when this spring semester in my University started, two of my friends moved out of the four person apartment we had on campus and two new girls moved it. I was excited when I found out one was from Scotland and the other was from England. Let me explain how I chose Greece.

A few months after my breakup with my ex that I was with for two and a half years, I got really close to one of my coworkers. We ended up becoming close and becoming really good friends and I got weird signals from him. I felt like he was into me and I knew I was definitely into him. I told my roommates about him and they encouraged me to invite him over so we could spend time together. Of course I was nervous but he was also one of my best friends so I knew everything would be alright if I acted like this was just us talking at work like we ususally do. When I met him outside to lead him to my apartment he asked what my roommates names were. His eyes almost popped out of his head when I said Emma who is from England. He said he was talking to her on Tinder and was too nervous to go inside my apartment. I told him to play it cool and to act like he didn't know because I didn't want to put myself in a bigger awkward situation knowing my roommate and best friend found each other attractive. Once we get inside my apartment I felt the awkward tension in the air. I felt disappointed but I knew they would act like they didn't know each other for my sake. That's when they were good friends. I know that sounds selfish but that's not the whole story yet. 

I constantly invited my friend over and made it very obvious that I was into him. After him not getting it I just gave up because I thought if someone could be that stupid and not notice how into them I was and not realize, then he would miss a lot more things if there was a chance of us being together. After maybe two or three weeks of distancing myself from him, he messaged me and said he realized that I was into him and cared for me a lot but only wanted me as a friend. I respected that and appreciated his honest answer and him being respectful. We decided to keep our friendship no matter how I felt. I just set one rule. The only rule that I had which was MY FRIENDS AND ROOMMATES ARE OFF LIMITS. I know it wasn't fair knowing the whole tinder situation but I just didn't want to be in the middle of anything and wanted my "friends" to respect the way I felt.

Then one day, my english roommate knocked on my door right before spring break and asked if she could talk to me. As soon as I heard "Can I talk to you?" I had already knew what it was about. She told me that she had been texting my friend for a while and he wanted to take her out for pizza but she wanted to make sure it was okay with me first. Of course inside I was angry because of the one rule I had set and she always talked about "girl code" and how she always follows it. This was the number one rule not to break, but she did. I didn't want to be selfish so I thought if I'm trying to be an adult I should just let it happen. I thought there is no way they are going to rub it in my face because they are my friends who care. I was completely wrong. 

After spring break he constantly came over every night and was always at our apartment. It was hard at first to see it but they kept their affection behind closed doors which made it easier. My friend Leticia that didn't move out with the other two who previously lived there was on the same side of the apartment that my english roommate, Emma, was in. Leticia would constantly complain to me that they were always so loud at night and sometimes she couldn't sleep. My friend was always busy with school because she is in pharmacy school but she also was too nice to tell our roommate she was too loud at night. So I decided to tell my friend that I worked with that he was too loud and that we prefer if he only stayed on the weekend when we didn't have school and maybe he could take Emma to his place since he didn't share with anyone. He apologized but instead of listening they ignored everything I had told him. 

Within a few days we all started getting petty with each other. Leticia and I would constantly ask them to clean up their stuff because it was almost always a mess but our english roommate expected everyone to do it for her. The scottish one mainly kept to herself when it came to conflict, which I respected. Then Emma made a racist comment about how my culture is disgusting and that she didn't want to see certain things in the kitchen. My friend Leticia who is also mexican american was angry at her comment in the group chat. After that comment, things just got even pettier. I ended up distancing myself from the conflict because my mental health was already not in a good state and if I didn't distance myself I probably would have gotten bad again.

After a lot of conflict, Emma and the guy who was my friend started having their own problems which we all expected because he was the type of guy she said she didn't want, and she was the type of girl he said he didn't want. Which was ironic because I warned both of them about that but they didn't care. Leticia always said that she thought maybe Emma thought it was a contest and wanted to show off how she could get him while I couldn't. So my friend blamed me for his problems even though I stopped talking to them for a while and he tried blaming me for ruining his life because she dumped him. I had to block him off all social media and his number because I just couldn't get bad again mentally. 

The whole point of this horrible memory I like to forget, is she's the reason why I picked to study abroad in Greece. My professor always tried to convince to go to Greece and after the whole situation with my "friends", I decided I didn't want to live in England if everyone was just like her. I know that's messed up for me to think that way, but I didn't wanted to be reminded of her. So last minute I picked to go to Greece instead of England. 

So here I am sitting by the window on my way to Greece. I really need this trip to change me. It has been over a year where I have just hated myself in every shape and form. It didn't help that I was cheated on plenty of times by the one person I thought would love me forever. See and the fucked up thing is that I was happy with myself and I loved myself before him but when we were in high school and stopped playing sports I invested all of my time into him and school. I lost all of my friends because he was the only person I wanted to be around. But that's what happens when you are young and in love. You become blind and isolate yourself from others, especially if it's your first love. I have seen it within myself and seen other girls do it to themselves. There's no rule book when you have your first love. You only really learn when you have your first real painful heartbreak. I felt worthless and felt like I wasn't good enough for so long which is so ironic because I felt so loved yet so worthless when I was with him. I hit the lowest point in my life after I broke up with him. I knew that I had to stop going back to him every time he cheated because he would always say he wouldn't do it again but did. I always took him back because he never laid his hands on me. It was never physcial abuse but there was a lot of emotinal abuse. Being Mexican you never really get taught about depression and anxiety you just learn that people who have that are "weak". It got to the point where I wouldn't move out of bed and all I could think about was not existing anymore. I had to tell my mom because if I didn't, my brother would of found my lifeless body. 

Going to therapy was so weird because my parents stuck it in my head that it was a "white people thing" and that Mexicans don't do that. I was tired of their judgement and just was so tired of feeling sad. Just like Bebe Rexha said "maybe I'm just comfortable being sad" and I wanted to just feel happiness again. I have always been a happy person and I just wanted to get back to my old ways. I didn't think I was going to open right away but once my therapist joked around at first and made me trust her I laid all my problems down. I know many people think it doesn't work but it only works if you actually try. She helped me understand the way I felt and how to accept it. I have always liked being in control of things in my life so I know that was the biggest issue. Also the first thing I had to do was forgive myself. As soon as I forgave myself for putting myself through so much pain the rest just got better. I never realized that all the sadness and hate I felt was not towards my ex, but towards myself. The process was hard but there was progess. I'm still not completely one hundred percent better but trying is all that matters. 

Maybe the moment the plane hits Greece my mind will click differently. Everyone does say if you see the world you will become a whole different person. I've been dreaming of change and pray that it comes.