I’ve told myself I can breathe without you a thousand times. The funny thing is, sometimes I can. Sometimes, my mind focuses for just a second on the street in front of me, on the words coming out of my friend’s mouth, and the oxygen flows in and I’m fine. Sometimes, I tell myself I’m okay and I actually believe it. Sometimes I believe you’re just a boy, and I’m just a girl, and there are millions of us out there and it’s okay. The hardest times aren’t when my math professor is boring me with his lecture, or when I hear your voice down the hallway. The worst times are actually when I’m laying in bed, and all I want to do is watch Netflix and check out and not have to think a single thought about you. As the character gives a speech that I’m sure would make me laugh in some other dimension, my mind flashes back to your touch, the way you held my hand while we were walking down the street, the way you pulled me in for that last kiss. All of the sudden, I feel every ounce of air in my lungs get trapped and I can’t figure out how to release it. In that panic, I know with all of my being that you’re exactly as important as I tell myself you’re not, that I’m lying if I said I was okay with the way things turned out. Somehow, I find a way to release the air, but you’re still there, looming over me like a feeling trapped in my chest. And I feel it, every god damn time I breathe.
