Evan

I was broken yet again. I didn’t want to be broken. I long for him to put back the pieces that he had so carelessly dropped on the floor and left behind. After a week of total silence, I texted him to let him know I was on my way. I explained that I had planned a date at a local movie theater for that evening and that I expected him to show up. I had prepared a letter of everything I wanted to say to him just in case I couldn’t get it out.

After making myself as physically attractive as I could, I drove three hours with no tears knowing I was going to have my heart broken for the final time.

I arrived at the movie theater 20 minutes ahead of time. I watched couples and families and groups of teenagers all make their way inside the movie theater after joyous greetings. I envied their laughter and grew sad at the sight of couples holding onto one another. Thirty minutes after the showing time had started, I realized he actually was going to stand me up. I wasn’t sad anymore. I was pissed.

In the words of a true millennial “mama didn’t raise no bitch”. I drove over to his apartment fully prepared to unleash my anger on this immature little punk. I screeched into the parking lot of his apartment complex where his car was sitting in front of his apartment. I stomped furiously up to his door, which I’m sure did not look very angry at all with my 4’10” and 100 lb stature.

I pounded on the door like a SWAT team. The door open just a couple inches and a face that did not belong to Evan poked through. His roommate very nervously told me he wasn’t here and had left with one of their other roommates. He also said he did not know when Evan would be back. I think he was scared I was going to wait. It was also insulting that he thought I was stupid enough to believe that. I knew Evan was hiding in the apartment, too much of a wimp to face me again.

I handed the letter I had so meticulously wrote to his roommate to give to Evan. I had hoped that he would read it and not just tear it up or throw it away. After all it was three pages long. I collected myself and walked back to my car. It wasn’t until I hit the highway on the way back home that I realize they were tears streaming down my face and I didn’t know how long they had been there.

_______________________________

I spent the rest of the night in my comfiest pajamas lounging on my couch with my bestest boy, Dusty, my beagle chihuahua mix. He was always up for a good cuddle and some Grey’s Anatomy as long as I shared my food. That’s when the text messages started again.

-Hey. I read your letter.

-Okay?

-Leaving you was the second biggest mistake of my life after not being in the room when my dad passed. Would you ever forgive me for doing this to you?

I wanted to so badly. My heart was completely his even if it was broken. Back then I thought the only way to fix it was for him to fix it since he was the one that caused all the damage. So I did. Stupid stupid mistake. I should’ve known from his charm and that he would say anything I wanted to hear so he could be relieved of whatever guilt he was feeling for the way he treated me. At that time I still thought that he was a person that didn’t actually exist. I thought he had realized his mistake and saw his perfect match in me after all. I wasn’t sad that he ghosted me a second time after asking for forgiveness. I was disappointed, but it was something I had gotten used to in the last month.

I have never felt more sick to my stomach then when I found out he was with someone else and that was the reason he left me. Not to get a college experience to its fullest, but because she was there and I was three hours away. I found this out around Christmas time when he messaged me wanting to explain himself for everything. She came across my People You May Know on social media and I had to fight the urge to break down and launch my phone across the Kroger I was standing in. Everywhere I looked was a reminder of him. Ghosts of relationship past.

I wish that were the end and I could say I had moved on and left the past in the past. But like any good Gen Yer, I had to make the mistake of letting him in again just to make sure it was a mistake. For scientific purposes.