This town looks different without you.

I’m not sure if it’s because I’d gotten so used to the view from the passenger seat of your car, or if it’s your actual absence that makes it feel off.  I think that it’s probably both.

It’s been almost a year since I last spoke to you, and almost as long since I last saw you.  It feels like an eternity since I last touched you.  I thought that I had moved on and that I had gotten used to being without, but there’s something about this time of year that reminds me of you; of us.

I don’t think you’ve ever really forgiven me for what happened, which almost makes me want to laugh, because I was the one that ended up with a broken heart and nothing to show for it.  But, because I’d promised myself to focus on letting all that go, I’ll try not to talk about it.  At least for now.

There was a snowfall recently, and the air is crisp.  I like being able to see my breath, it makes me feel a little more alive.  Part of me had gone dead without you, and it hurts me to say that.  It hurts me to think that I’m not capable of being my own, whole human being without your presence to spark life into me.  I’m working on that, you know.

I spent countless hours across from a counselor that was supposedly helping me through a depression that you weren’t strong enough to stomach.  It still hurts to think that you could walk away from me knowing how low I’d really gotten.  But I’m not going to talk about that…yet.

I took up a job as a secretary at the doctor’s office where my mom works.  It helps to know people in high places.  I like it.  It’s straight forward and repetitive and I spend four hours of my life not thinking about things; not thinking about you.  I leave at the end of the day a few dollars richer and a few hours older.  I can’t see anything wrong with that.

I’ve also continued on with my classes.  A year and a half to go before I graduate, and then I have that one year of grad school.  I hope it lasts forever. I don’t think I’m really ready to be out in the adult world yet.  I hardly managed to navigate my teenage years, and I’m just barely hanging on to the start of my twenties.  I can’t imagine how I’ll cope with the rest of my life.  But, I suppose, I’ll manage.  I’ll have to.

The days have become repetitive.  I feel as if I’m wading through a dense haze and I’m not really sure what direction I’m headed in.  I’ve been told that it’ll get better with time, but that never really succeeds in making me feel any better about what I’m going through.  You always used to hate it when I would supplement your description of a bad day with a similarly gruesome day of my own.  The proverbial “You think your day was bad…how about this…” and now I understand why you hate it so much.  It doesn’t help.

I’ve started to get used to the constant feeling of sour stomach and sea-sickness that comes when I think about you, especially when I think about you with her.  I find the harder I try to keep my mind from wandering in your direction, the more it seems I’m on a one way street.  This too will stop someday.  I hope.

My aforementioned counselor told me that writing down my thoughts and feelings would be a good way for me to cope.  I shouldn’t be surprised that it’s taken the form of a letter to you, but somehow I am.  Perhaps it makes me realize just how ingrained you had become in my every day life, even when your no longer a part of it, I can’t help but include you.

So, with the encouragement of my counselor, I’m going to write my story; the one about you and me.

The one where I end up alone; without you.

I promise to try and not to make it too bitter, but you’ll have to forgive me if I slip.

I can still remember the first day we met.  It was in the grocery store, and I spotted you in the produce section among the various fruits and vegetables.  (If you were here with me, as I write this story, you would interject some sordid comment about my melons, and how you happened to be admiring them at the time.)

I have never pursued a man before, at least not in the way I went after you.  I was like a woman possessed, and you were the object of my desire.  I couldn’t get you out of my head. 

I remember most the freckles on your nose.  I can’t say I recall what you were wearing, or what you had in your shopping cart, but I vividly remember the freckles that were spattered across your nose.  I thought they were cute.

I had decided at the time, that fate came into play that day, when I learned that you and I shared a mutual friend.  I begged her for your screen name and phone number, and then I chickened out when it came to actually talking to you.  She had to coax me into it, and it wasn’t until I had the excuse of planning her party that I actually found the guts to contact you.

You were nervous about coming because you thought you wouldn’t know anyone, but you said you would.  I hoped it was because of me, but even now I’m not really sure why you came.  I do know that for the entire party my friends kept telling me that you were into me, but I couldn’t believe them until I saw some proof.  I didn’t want to get my hopes up.

I didn’t have to worry, because I don’t think we spent more than 12 hours apart that next week.  I went home to sleep, and then I somehow found myself back with you.  I’m surprised that we didn’t get sick of each other that week, but young love has funny ways of distorting things.  I have never let a man (or boy, you were only seventeen at the time) consume me like that, but I liked the butterflies you gave me.

My favorite time about that week was our trips to the beach.  It was early in the year and too cold for the beach, but somehow being with you and your friends made standing in cold sand fun.  I stole your sweatshirt that night, too, and I used to take it with me everywhere.  There was something so comforting about being wrapped up in a sweatshirt that was two sizes too big and that smelled of you.  Sometimes I wish I hadn’t given it back.

Those first three months were some of the best I’d ever had.  Being your girlfriend made me so damn happy, I’m not sure you realize how in love with you I’d actually become.

All I wanted to do was spend time with you.  It was hard, having two different schedules and two separate lives, but you can bet that every weekend I was at your house and in your arms.  It was so innocent and so real at first.  I taught you that it was OK to fall in love and you taught me how to let go and be spontaneous.  I still have trouble when things aren’t planned…you’re not here to help me relax.

You were my life…I don’t think you know that.

I didn’t want to sit here and relive everything we went through, because it’s painful to remember everything I’ve lost.  But I can’t just write you off and tell you goodbye without going back to the beginning and explaining where we went wrong.

You’ll probably never read this. Hell, I’ll probably never send this.  But I can’t stop thinking about you and I can’t seem to move on with my life without you here.

This is my last ditch effort to say goodbye for real.  I pray to God that it works because I’m not sure how much longer I can handle feeling like this.  Feeling like living without you is the worst thing I’ll ever have to endure.