Chapter 2
Sometimes healing is a road meant for one. No matter how much Wheein and Hyejin try to help you, all their efforts feel futile. Sure they can pat your back, but they can’t stop your tears. They can tell you things will be ok, but that doesn’t dull your pain. Sometimes you even prefer they don’t try at all. Sometimes all you can do is sob and heave until you vomit and when they have to look after you and clean the mess you’ve become, you feel like a burden, you wish they would just leave you be. Sometimes all you want to do is cuddle up in her old T-shirts, make yourself her favourite hot cocoa and drink it while looking at old pictures, that’s when all they can do is look at you with sad eyes and you can’t help but feel so pathetic you almost start crying again. Sometimes you are one second away from texting her and when they stop you, you can’t help but hate them a little. In the end of the day you are immensely grateful you have such great friends that would never leave you even during your lowest points. But sometimes you just feel like they would never get it. They haven’t seen her smile while humming along to songs on the radio, they haven’t seen her jump up and down in pure joy when you let her pick what movie to watch, haven’t heard her whisper “I love you” half-asleep in the middle of the night when you get back to bed with a glass of water, haven’t seen her coming undone in a sea of soft moonlight, haven’t heard her say goodbye and haven’t had their hearts ripped apart by her soft and vicious hands. They just don’t understand. They never had her and they never lost her.
Sometimes you feel more alone than ever. Sometimes you feel like you’re the last person on earth and no one else understands you. Maybe in the end of the day you were sitting in a prison of your own making.
Billions of people, even trillions have had their hearts broken during the course of time. There are oceans of tears that have been shed, millions of poems about loss and songs about heartache and you for some reason feel special. Even after you went through hundreds of reddit pages where people said all the same shit, after you watched thousands of self-help videos, read through all the comments, you even bought a couple of books when you were most desperate… even after all that, you still didn’t find what you needed. You went through all the advice in the world and it still didn’t help. No one could help you deal with pain they had not felt. Even if everyone at some point lives through a break up, every break up is different. You don’t see how you can use someone else’s advice, maybe it worked for them, but it's been 6 months and you still can’t find peace after all your efforts.
Maybe you just were never gonna get over it.
Do not respond!!!
Byul, stop ignoring me
You look at the message for what feels like hours. You think about responding, then curse yourself out, then spend an hour writing and rewriting responses, then throw your phone away. You listen to some music, flower your plants, take the dogs for a walk then stop acting like you could ever just ignore her no matter how hard you tried. You spent years averting your eyes like she wasn’t the only thing you could ever think about.
Moonbyul
Give me one reason to ever talk to you again.
You go make dinner, burn yourself because you’re too distracted, drop some pans, curse a lot and finally manage to salvage whatever you tried to cook. In the end you’re so nervous you don’t even feel hungry and throw most of your dinner away. You finally look at your phone and feel your stomach turn.
Do not respond!!!
Do I really have to?
And with that all efforts to compose yourself go out the window.
Moonbyul
You’re such a bitch
I guess you know that
Do not respond!!!
You’ve told me, yes.
You’re just about to block her, when you see her send some more messages
Do not respond!!!
Look
I’m not trying to piss you off
Moonbyul
It looks like that’s exactly what you’re trying to do
Do not respond!!!
I said I was sorry
You’re the one ignoring me
Moonbyul
I’m in no way obliged to accept your apology
Do not respond!!!
I know
You are not
Still I hope you do
You take a deep breath. You look around your apartment. See the dirty clothes everywhere, the scattered furniture and unwashed dishes. All you see is a giant mess like the one in your head and you feel your anxiety on the rise. You get up, clean after your cooking fiasco and go outside on your balcony.
Moonbyul
You hurt me, Yongsun
Even if I wanted
I’m not sure I can
You look at the stars outside and start tracing them to calm yourself down.
Do not respond!!!
I know
You take a deep breath and feel like a weight was lifted off your shoulders. Weirdly it’s not her apology that made you feel better, it's the fact that for the first time you think she finally understands how much suffering she had caused you. You start typing.
Yongsun
I was hurt as well
You stop. You pull your face into a grimace, look away from your phone to take another breath.
Moonbyul
It was all your own doing
Yongsun
Don’t you even try to put it all on me
Moonbyul
Whatever I did, I did it because of you
Yongsun
You were possessive to obsession, your insecurities were always lingering above us every single moment, you were immature and don’t you fucking try to blame it all on me
Moonbyul
And you cheated
Plain and simple
No need to psychoanalyze you
You are nothing more than a cheating whore
She blocked you after that. You curse out the whole universe on your small balcony. You hit the railing, kick it a couple of times then finally give up and lean against it for a moment. You look up at the stars and wonder how they can look so close, but then end up being lightyears away from each other.
You hear your phone ringing. You see her picture.
When you pick up there are a couple of minutes of silence. And then...
“I can’t even explain how sorry I am.”
You haven’t heard her voice in half a year. It sounds different. More troubled. She had tried to apologise before, but it never felt like this. Like it mattered.
“You’ve said it before.”
“I know.”
“What? Do you want me to apologise as well”
“No”, there is a moment where she hesitates and pauses,”I just wanted to hear your voice.”
And in that moment you know. You are never going to get over her.
You start crying on the phone with your ex that cheated on you half a year ago and think how you’ve reached rock bottom. You hear her cry as well and feel vindicated. At least in the end both of you were equally fucked.
“I tried to get over you. I tried to get rid of you, that’s why I cheated. I just felt like I was suffocating”, you hear her ramble frantically, but every word is like a stab in your chest.
“I just wasn’t happy, Moonbyul. I know it was selfish, I didn’t mean to hurt you, I just… I just felt miserable.”
“Are you happy now!?”, you try not to scream, but the words burn through your throat.
There is a pause. Both of you know the answer.
“I’m sorry I had to drag you down with me”
And then you realise it. The only person that really understands what you’ve been going through the past 6 months was the one that put you through them.