I began to spiral searching for answers in the wrong places: my looks, my body, my words.
I once again reread every conversation we had, zoomed into my pictures, tried to see myself through his eyes. "What was so wrong with me that silence became his only answer?"
I deleted his number.
Then I saved it again.
Then blocked him.
Then unblocked him.
The cycle was maddening.
My period came five days late. The moment I saw the blood, I dropped to the floor of my bathroom and cried, half in relief, half in rage.
All of it had been for nothing. The fear,the panic and the pain. He didn't even care to ask if I was okay. He just disappeared like what happened between us didn't mean a thing.
But it meant everything to me.
The first person to touch me like that. The first person to make me believe I was finally worth the risk.
And now I was left with shame I couldn't name.
I stopped eating properly.
Classes became white noise. I'd sit in lectures and hear nothing. Sometimes I'd stare at the lecturer's mouth moving and not catch a single word. All I could think about was "him" and "me".
And the girl I used to be before him.
I avoided people, avoided mirrors too.
I felt like my body wasn't mine anymore.
I remember sitting alone in the cafeteria, watching my food grow cold, while groups of friends around me laughed over fries and soda. I felt invisible or maybe I wanted to be.
It wasn't just heartbreak, it was humiliation.
I had no one to blame but myself,so I thought.
I didn't dare tell anyone what happened.
Not my roommates, not my friends,not even the friend I used to call my "second sister."
I didn't want their pity.
I didn't want their judgment.
I didn't want their stories of "this happened to me too".
I wanted silence.
But silence is cruel when it's your only companion.
Nights were the worst.
That's when the memories came like waves crashing over me…his hands, his breath, his voice telling me I was beautiful, that he wasn't going anywhere.
Lies or maybe just temporary truths.
One night, I picked up my phone and typed a message I didn't send:
"Michael… you could've at least said goodbye".
Instead, I deleted it.
Then typed it again.
Then deleted it again.
What was the point?
He didn't care.
I used to think if I saved my body, I'd save my heart. But no one tells you how heartbreak comes whether you wait or not.
I had waited,I had believed and I still ended up broken.
I changed.
Subtly, at first. Then all at once.
I stopped dressing the same. I started wearing clothes that hid more of me. I didn't want to be noticed.
I didn't want anyone asking if I was okay. I wore my pain like perfume..quiet but always present.
My friends said I seemed distant and tired.
"Girl, are you sick?"
"You don't talk much these days."
I'd smile and say, "Just tired."
Tired was easier than telling them I felt empty.
Even my grades slipped.
A lecturer once handed back a paper and looked at me with furrowed brows. "You're smarter than this," he said. I nodded.
I wanted to say, "Not anymore".
But I stayed silent.
Because that's what I had become..quiet.
Not out of peace.
Out of shame.
The worst part? I missed him.
Even knowing how he hurt me. Even knowing he wasn't who I thought he was.
I missed his laugh.
The way he called me by my full name like it was poetry.
The way he once said, "You're safe with me."
I wanted to hate him. God!!, I tried.
But the heart doesn't follow logic.
It follows memories.
I tried distracting myself..watching movies, journaling, listening to music. But everything reminded me of him.
A song would play and I'd hear his voice.
A couple would pass holding hands and I'd flinch inside.
Then came the dreams.
In one of them, we were sitting in his room again. He was holding my hand and telling me he was sorry.
That he panicked.
That he never meant to hurt me.
I woke up with tears soaking my pillow, still clinging to the lie my brain gave me to sleep on.
I hated that part of me. The one that still wanted closure. The one that still cared.
Eventually, I got angry.
Angry at myself.
How could I be so stupid?
How could I give him that part of me and expect him to honor it?
I started writing..not pretty poems or quotes, but raw, unfiltered entries.
He touched me like I mattered.
Then left me like I was trash.
I'm not even sure if I hate him or hate myself more.
Writing became therapy, my only safe place.
That's when I realized: I couldn't keep waiting for him to make me feel whole again,he wasn't coming back.
And even if he did, I wasn't the same girl anymore.
I tried to focus on healing.
Little things.
Drinking water.
Going for walks.
Playing my old favorite songs.
Trying to feel like me again.
But every time I made progress, a shadow of him would come back.
A scent..a name…a class reminder.
And it would hit me like a punch to the chest.
Because the worst heartbreaks don't just break you once, they echo.
And his silence echoed louder than any goodbye.
Weeks later, I found out through a classmate that Michael had been seeing another girl before me.
Maybe during.
The timeline blurred.
I remember feeling numb.
Not shocked. Not even hurt.
Just… empty.
So he wasn't scared.
He wasn't confused.
He just used me and moved on.
Just like that.
I walked to the campus garden that evening. The sky was grey, the wind cold.
I sat alone on a bench, watching people laugh around me.
How was the world still moving when mine had paused?
And then something shifted.
As I sat there…hugging my knees, tears threatening to spill, a thought hit me like lightning:
This can't be the end of me.
If I let this define me, I'd always be the girl he broke.
But if I wrote this story…really wrote it, maybe I could become the girl who rose.
Not the girl who got used.
Not the girl who made a mistake.
But the girl who survived it.
So I stood up from that bench and walked home, not healed, not whole but determined.
I was still broken.
But I was breathing.
And sometimes, that's enough.
That night, just as I was falling asleep…
My phone buzzed.
It was Michael.
One message.
One line.
"Hey… can we talk"?