Page 44 of Down My Chimney

I went through the motions. School ended. Grades rolled in. I went out with my friends, but these friends—real people who cared about me and had pulled me through rough patches before—felt as insubstantial as ghosts. I sat in a booth at our diner and felt like I could look right through them. Like nothing was real except me and the hole in my chest.

Or maybeIwas the ghost. Maybe I’d been a ghost for months, and clinging to Blake was the only thing that let me live in denial for so long. Maybe nothing seemed real now because I should have moved on a long time ago.

After four days, I texted him a picture of Mittens when she got her head stuck in a glass of water on my nightstand. I was pretty sure the scratches I got trying to free her were her vengeance for me stopping to take a picture of her first.

I typed that out in a text, then wondered if that was even funny. Wondered if my sense of humor was permanently warped, and only war criminals would send people pictures of cats with their heads stuck in water glasses. But this was the longest we’d gone without talking since December, and I had to say something.

I sent the text, then tried to convince myself I wasn’t waiting for a response. Friends didn’t do that, right? I couldn’t remember.

Ten hours later, he texted me back.Haha, nice.

The ache inside me grew.

A week later, I started working for Blake’s parents. They laughed and joked and brought me smoothies and told me I was doing a good job, but even they could tell something was wrong. It hurt being near them because they reminded me of him, but I still listened hungrily every time they talked, hoping they’d say his name.

I’d told him it was time to stop lying to people, but I realized now how dumb that was. As long as I hurt like this, and as long as I couldn’t talk about it, I’d be lying.

Which meant I would be lying for the rest of my life.

Six days after work began, when his parents were out of town for the weekend, Blake texted me a picture of Woody farting himself awake from a nap. It made me feel a little better about the cat picture, until he said Woody ate a plate of veggie burgers at the cabin, so now he was full of beans. Suddenly, all I could think about was the night he’d kissed me at the cabin, then run away.

I’d thought nothing could hurt worse than that.

I’d been wrong.

I attempted to learn how to do my job, because his parents were paying me too well not to, and because maybe, if I focused hard enough on work, I could get just one hour of peace. One minute where I wasn’t missing him. One second where my heart wasn’t bleeding.

I told myself that friends spent time together. That they talked on the phone, for real. But I stuck to texting, and only about the most innocuous subjects. This wasn’t what I meant when I said I knew he needed a friend, but I couldn’t bring myself to suggest hanging out.

I kept waiting for Blake to suggest it.

But he didn’t.

May turned into June turned into July turned into August, and I realized how naive I’d been. Too much lay between us now—or maybe not enough. Either way, we couldn’t go back to being friends. We were too different.

We just grew apart for a while. Maybe we needed to do that, to become who we needed to be.

Does that mean we’re growing apart again now?

I’d told him no, but I realized that was a lie too.

My family asked if I wanted a going away party, but I said no. That, at least, was true. No part of me felt like pretending to be happy when I wasn’t.

Besides, I knew they’d invite Blake and his family, and he’d either make up an excuse to avoid coming, which would crush me, or he’d come, and I’d have to see him, and that would crush me even more.

I’d spent the summer numbing myself, but the night before I went to the airport, I sobbed. This spring, I’d been worried that Blake would move on if I were gone for four months. Now, part of me was desperate to do exactly that. To stop seeing signs of him everywhere in my life.

And that terrified me.

I felt like if I left, I might never come back. Not the same version of me, anyway. Because how could I leave this continent, go all the way up in the sky, with this grief holding me down? Wouldn’t I have to let go of it to cross the ocean?

But if I lost it, I felt like I’d lose my last tie to Blake. The day I stopped mourning what we’d had was the day it was truly over.

I’d wanted to stop lying to people, but as long as I had something to lie about, at least I knew this hadhappened. That what we’d had wasn’t a dream, wasn’t some fantasy I’d made up. It had happened, and neither one of us could deny it.

I wasn’t sure I would recognize myself, without the sting of loss. Who would I become, the day I saw grief’s handprint on my cave wall and felt nothing but a wistful sigh?

That, I realized, was the price of becoming friends again: letting go. Moving on. Accepting this was the end. And his words echoed back to me again.

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