the end of every tether (waitin for what once was)

Three months later

Aeri found herself thinking a lot about the reality of heartbreak recently. 

She’d always thought that the way the movies portrayed it must have an element of truth to it. After all, they all seemed to tell the same story. And sure, it definitely did feel like that, but that was only ten percent of the reality of the matter. The problem with the movies is they always pinpointed it to one specific moment, after which everything was right, moving on felt clean. That healing was some linear process. Slow, and maybe even painful, but sensical.

It didn’t feel like that for her. Hell, she wasn’t even sure she’d figured out how it felt at all. 

Heartbreak wasn’t just one singular moment for her, it was a culmination of losses, of grief. The man she’d thought she loved and would spend her life with. Jimin, the one person she thought understood her better than anyone. But the scariest loss of all? Herself. Because somewhere in the middle of it all, she felt like she’d become a person she no longer recognised. 

She always used to be so certain of her life, her memories, everything. But now? Now it felt like someone had taken her entire life and completely changed the angle. Like she’d been looking at everything vertically, but in reality everything was being played out horizontally. 

Perspective, it’s a funny thing. So is trust. 

For weeks afterwards she'd convinced herself that trying was enough. That if she loved him hard enough, if she wanted the relationship enough, eventually the memories would stop hurting. That’d she’d be able to learn how to live with him, live with herself again. 

She couldn’t.

Every time she closed her eyes, she pictured the lie. She remembered thanking him for the apartment, kissing him after he’d viewed it, telling him she didn’t know what she’d do without him. 

Those memories no longer belonged to the person she'd been when they happened. They belonged to the truth she'd learned afterward. Everything had been contaminated. And yes, he still loved her and she still loved him. But despite what everyone tells you, love most definitely does not fix all. Because love can be broken and still work. Trust can’t survive contamination. 

“I don’t hate you, I just don’t want this anymore. I don’t want us.” There was no anger left anymore, no, Aeri couldn’t bring herself to be anything but exhausted. She’d spent too much time feeling angry, feeling sad, feeling confused. Now all she wanted to do was sleep, existing had become too tiresome. 

He nods once, almost like he’d been expecting those exact words to come out of her mouth. He’d known this conversation was coming long before she’d asked to have it. They hadn’t been the same, and deep down, he knew they never would. 

"I kept hoping," he says, hands clasped together to stop them from shaking. "That one morning you'd wake up and look at me the way you used to." He laughs softly. "You never did."

Aeri’s eyes sting with the tears that threaten to appear. She sighs to herself, she was tired of crying, she’d spent too much time doing that over the past few weeks. "I kept thinking..." she whispers eventually. "...that one day I'd wake up and it wouldn't hurt anymore."

He nodded slowly.

"It didn't." She laughs quietly to herself. "And I hate that, I really do."

"So do I."

"I think it’s impossible to try to force something that isn't coming back."

He lets out a slow breath through his nose and nods once. "I know."

Silence settles between them briefly. Not exactly comfortable, but not awkward either. Just the kind of silence that settles between two people who know each other too well, but don’t know how to talk to each other anymore.

There are no raised voices left, no accusations waiting to be thrown - those had burned themselves out weeks ago. All that remained was exhaustion, sitting quietly between two people who had once planned an entire future together.

"I think I knew," he says eventually. "Not immediately." He smiles sadly. "I kept telling myself you just needed time, but instead I just kept moving the finish line because I couldn't accept we'd already crossed it." 

"I wasn't pretending for you, I was pretending for me." She sighs. "I wanted so badly to be the kind of person who could forgive this." Her eyes finally meet his. "I’m just not."

"I'm glad you stopped trying." He smiles. "Every morning I'd wonder if today would be the day you smiled at me without thinking about it first. And I know you tried really hard, I could see it every day." He pauses to run a hand through his hair.  "So thank you, really."

Aeri smiles, though there's very little happiness in it. "I wish you hadn't noticed."

He lets out a quiet laugh. "How could I not?"

She looks down at her hands. "I wanted to fool you."

"I know."

"I wanted one of us to believe it was getting better but instead," she whispers, "every morning I woke up hoping I'd forgotten." She laughs quietly to herself. "And every morning I remembered all over again."

"I know." 

"I'm sorry it wasn't enough." 

He shakes his head immediately. "Don't apologise."

She frowns. "Why not?"

"Because I think we both know you gave me everything you had left." He reaches across the table without thinking, before pulling back again. "I hope one day," he says quietly, "you can find your way back to yourself."

The silence that follows feels unbearable. Eventually, he stands. "So..."

"So."

"I guess this is goodbye."

Aeri nods. "I guess it is."

He reaches the front door before stopping and for a long moment he stands there looking at the floor. "You don't have to forgive her." He shakes his head. "No, you probably shouldn't. But..." He pauses, almost like he’s struggling to find the right words. "...don't let what happened erase twenty-four years."

Aeri closes her eyes. Twenty-four years. She hated that he was right. She hated even more that she'd been thinking the same thing. 

The door clicks shut behind him, and for the first time in weeks, she allows herself to cry. Not because she'd made the wrong decision, but because sometimes the right decision still breaks your heart.

The one thing Aeri wasn't sure she'd ever get used to is the silence. Not because he'd always filled it. He hadn't. He'd always been the quiet one, content to sit beside her for hours without saying much at all. Somehow, though, losing someone so quiet had left behind the loudest absence she'd ever known. 

The feeling always appeared at the strangest of times, in the most mundane of places.

The extra mug she'd instinctively reached for one morning before realising there was nobody to make coffee for anymore. The empty side of the sofa as she watched her favourite dramas, catching herself turning to comment on her theories on to realise there was no one there. The second toothbrush she'd almost thrown away three separate times before quietly putting it back.

It turned out the things she missed most weren't the grand gestures. They were the routines so ordinary she'd never thought to cherish them until they were gone. 

Sleep became the biggest battlefield. Not the ability to fall asleep, per se, but staying asleep. Waking up in the middle of the night, half asleep, and reaching for a warmth that no longer existed anymore. 

For the first few weeks she'd still slept on her own side of the bed, almost as if she was still waiting for someone to occupy the other space, as if it still belonged to somebody. Eventually she'd started sleeping in the middle. Not because she'd moved on, but because pretending there were still two people in the room had become too painful.

Waking up was also hard. Fighting the automatic reflex to call out over her shoulder, asking if she should make tea or coffee. To be halfway through the question before realising she no longer needed to ask it.

That was the funny thing about heartbreak. The songs describe it as dancing, crying, screaming. In reality Aeri found it to be more like the kind of grief you just can’t shake. Undignified, undramatic, just a lingering sadness.