Mine Would Be You (4)

“Nina, give me the bottle and the phone, please.”

The bottle of whiskey is clutched closely to my chest. White Moscato just wasn’t cutting it anymore. And I can’t seem to pull myself away from Myles’s Facebook page, which I searched up just for this moment. It’s filled to the brim with engagement pictures of him and Emma Tate.

It’s perfect. She’s perfect. Everything looks fucking perfect.

To go along with their perfect invites and soon-to-be perfect wedding.

Light brown hair flows past her shoulders and around her impeccable, oval face. Her entire face is symmetrical; her eyes aren’t too far apart or too close. Her nose is just slightly upturned above her lips, which are painted red in all of their engagement photos.

I raise the bottle to my lips, ignoring Sloan’s quiet request for me to give it up. “I can’t believe this.”

The liquid burns going down my throat, and it warms me from the inside out. Two years is a long time retrospectively. But when you break it apart it isn’t. For him to be engaged and getting married in a few months, a few months past our two-year breakup point—it still feels like it happened quickly.

Maybe it’s because my two years were spent differently.

Mine were spent in therapy, addressing my faults, my attachment style, my issues and how they and Myles’s behavior may affect me going forward. Going over and over our relationship and where it went wrong. I had to repeatedly remind myself that nothing I did was the sole reason for the end of us.

Not to say I’m blame free, but I was more often the one in pain than the one causing it.

I can’t help but spiral back into us for a moment.

He won’t look at me.

That’s all I can think about as we sit on the stoop outside my parents’ house. The sun is beating down onto my sweatshirt-covered shoulders in early spring. It should be warm, but I’m just cold. Goosebumps are spread all over my arms and down my spine.

He looks beautiful, but he almost looks foreign back in Brooklyn. It’s his Easter break, his last one before he graduates, and he’s already got this fresh graduate glow. I’m jealous that I still have a year to go. I’m jealous he’s so far ahead of me. But I’m not jealous of how distant he looks on the stoop we’ve sat on for years.

He looks unfamiliar, unknown, next to me. Because he’s never not looked at me.

From when we were running around as kids in the playground or streets of Brooklyn, he’s always looked at me.

But I guess that’s unfair of me, to want him to look at me one last time, since I’m officially ending things. Ever since he left for school, things haven’t been right. We’ve been on and off and on again, repeatedly. But I didn’t know how to be in a world without him all that time.

Little did I know, I was living in one, I just wasn’t aware.

And I’d rather be alone than be strung along and led on only to realize it’ll never be the same. We’ll never be best friends again. We’ll never spend the fourth of July together, never celebrate our birthdays or holidays again. I’ll never cheer him on in the stands again. He’ll never watch me with hazy eyes as I try on my favorite latest fashion trend in the dimness of my room.

“I know I’m ending it,” I start quietly, “but it’s been over for a while, hasn’t it?”

I’m scared of the answer, even though I know it. We used to never run out of words to say, never have awkward silences, never fight. But all we’ve done, all we do, is walk on eggshells around each other.

As if we’re both scared of stepping on a crack in our foundation and watching it all crumble.

He crosses his arm, and his eyes flicker to me. I look down at the concrete.

“You’re the one ending it, so you tell me.”

The words are harsh, but I hear the hurt underneath them. We both know the truth, but that doesn’t make it hurt any less.

“You don’t get to be mad at me, Myles. Things haven’t been the same since you left for college years ago. You don’t treat me like I’m someone you care about. And I’m not going to sit here and wait for you with my breath held until you make up your mind anymore.”

He sighs and finally really looks at me. My eyes start to prick, and I can feel my throat tighten as I dig my nails into my palm.

“I love you, Myles. I’ve loved you since we were kids running down this street. But we’ll never be those kids again.” I laugh, but it’s shallow and dry. “You’re not in love with me. You haven’t been for years. I won’t chase someone who’s made it clear I’m not what they wanted for years. It just took me until now to see it.”

Now it’s me who can’t look at him.

“I never meant to do this to us, to you. I’m sorry, I mean that. I just didn’t know how to let you go. You were a part of my life for so long, and I didn’t think we’d end up here. I never meant to do this,” Myles says, but the words feel empty to me.

It’s hard to believe it, after seeing the videos and images of his social life when he was away. The same girl appearing in all the pictures or videos during his senior year. He went from never hiding anything from me to always turning his phone away or ending our nightly facetimes early or canceling plans. I was never an anxious person.

Until I became one.