23. Seven Years Ago — Adelaide
TWENTY-THREE
SEVEN YEARS AGO — ADELAIDE
At seven in the morning on Thursday August 7th, Eunbin was pronounced dead.
On August 8th, we held her funeral at the same graveyard where my parents were buried.
The sky cried as her death brought flowers to their knees and wilting stems decayed.
I’d lost three people I loved in under a decade.
I wondered what Eunbin would think about the man talking about God in front of her when she didn’t believe in religion.
She’d laugh softly, whisper something incredibly funny in my ears, then pull me closer and rest her chin on my head.
My chest constricted. Tears fell down my cheeks, burying themselves in these restless graves.
People sobbed all around, but my eyes were on one person.
His pants were muddy and soaked with rain. Christian stood right in front of Eunbin’s grave all alone.
With a sniffle, I nudged past people to get to him. I didn’t need to look at him to know that he was pretending to be okay. That’s who Christian was. When Eunbin’s cancer relapsed and she was sent to the hospital, he held his tears in even when they pricked at his eyes.
His sadness called to mine, our waves crashing and turning into one. A tsunami wouldn’t withstand the force of us.
I took the black shawl off my shoulders and wrapped it over his, keeping my hand on his back. “Christian.”
When he didn’t look at me, I coerced him to face me. My other hand reached up to touch his cheeks. He was so cold.
“Baby,” I caressed his cheekbone. “Come here.”
His lips quivered before he pulled me into him.
My breath got stuck in my throat.
He held me like he wanted to merge us into one, like he wanted to rip my heart out of my chest, to crack it and use my broken pieces to fill in the empty spots in his own heart.
That’s what losing someone felt like. Not broken, not scared, but pure desperation of finding something to fill in those empty spaces, to stop them from pouring down with blood—to prevent the cracking and breaking and leaving us emptier than we already were.
Christian’s hand dug themselves through my hair, keeping me close to him.
I kept my arms around his neck, not caring about how people were staring at us. This moment was for him, for all the memories with his mom he’d never get back.
“Adelaide,” I held onto him tighter when his broken sobs hiccupped into my shirt.
My own voice broke with sobs when I replied, “I’m here.”
We held each other like that until the sun fell to its feet and people disappeared.
He pulled away, his eyes rimmed red.
I cupped his face, wiping away the fallen tear, when he pushed my hand away.
“Christian,” I took a step towards him, but he moved back, raising his palm up in front of me.
I halted.
Emotionless. “I can’t do this anymore, Adelaide.”
I grappled with the feeling of shattered glass in my chest, each shard sticking to a vein. Heartbreak poured out from each rip, disconnecting me from myself.
“You don’t mean that.” He was full of grief. It was normal to pull away. “It’s okay.”
An emotionless chuckle.
“You’re kidding right?”
He ran a hand through his hair, tears falling down his cheeks. “I don’t want to be with you anymore, Adelaide.”
“Christian, you just lost your mom. Your emotions are heightened?—”
“Stop making fucking excuses when we were going down this path anyways.”
Thunder rumbled.
“What are you talking about?”
“You didn’t think this,” he pointed back and forth between us. “Was gonna last, right?”
I didn’t answer .
“Adelaide, you’re not the girl I’m going to marry. You were never gonna be that girl for me. You were just an experiment for me. To use. To fuck .”
I flinched at his words, putting more distance between us even though everything he was saying did a good enough job of that.
“You want to break up? Right now?” I looked down at Eunbin’s grave between us. If she was listening, she’d be clawing her nails at the coffin—begging to be let out, to crack Christian’s head open and fill it with common sense.
“I’ve wanted to break up for a long time.”
We stared at each other.
Sobs racketed through my chest when I said, “You don’t mean it.”
He shook his head in disbelief. “Stop being delusional.”
“Why?” I whispered. “Why do you want to break up?”
“Because your existence is suffocating!”
Reeling back with tears, “Then what about all the confessions you made?”
“Confessions are meant to be broken,” he stared at me straight on.
“Was all of it a lie then?” I wrapped my arms around my body.
A beat. “Yes.”
“Even when you…” A crack. “When you told me you loved me?”
I couldn’t look at him. I don’t think I’d ever be able to look at him again.
Especially not when his voice rocked hard against my stained skin, pulling out the shards from my veins, only to stab them directly in my heart.
Waiting for him to answer would be torture when I knew what it would be.
When I turned around, my feet digging into the muddy grass, I thought of our secret kisses, the truthful confessions, the loving gazes.
All of it was gone.
A delusion I spent all my time alone in.
Christian was the imagination parents forced their kids to forget about.
And as I walked to my car, my gut emptied itself of all Christian reminiscents—leaving behind a tear in the shape of the girl who still loved him.
That Night — 2 AM
“Christian!” I banged at his apartment door. Tears clung to my chest, waiting for him to open the door. “Please, open the door!”
An older lady stood with a sad expression on her face before shutting her door. No, there was nothing sad. I could fix this. Christian needed me. He… couldn’t be alone right now.
The door swung open just as I was about to bang again.
Osama looked down at me, his face full of worry. “You shouldn’t be here. He’s not at his best right now.”
I pushed past him, “I don’t care. I need to be here for him.”
Christian stood on the other side. I didn’t recognize him, but it didn’t matter, I’d learn to recognize every version of him.
“Christian, I can’t leave you alone. Not yet. Please .”
Despite the desperation in my voice, he didn’t budge. “Take her home, Osama.”
“No!” I screamed when Osama moved closer. “We don’t have to break up, I’ll be whoever you want me to be, Christian. Please don’t do this, not today.”
“What don’t you understand about me dumping you? I don’t want you anymore, Adelaide. Leave me the fuck alone.”
When he turned his back to me, walking to his room. I did the only thing that came to mind.
I got down on my knees. “You may not love me, maybe you don’t want me anymore, but let me love you Christian. Let me take care of you, please. You shouldn’t be alone at a time like this,” I begged.
Something flashed across his eyes, before he fisted his hands. “Get up, Adelaide.”
“Not until you take it back.”
“You’re making a fool of yourself.”
“Then I’m your fool.”
“Stop it,” he hissed. “Stop being like this when I don’t want you anymore. I don’t have space in my heart to be someone as needy as you. All you do is want and take; you never give. You act like the world revolves around you—fucking thinking that everything will be alright as long as you’re there for me, but it won’t. You’re the last person I want in my life.”
Hastily, I shook my head. “Your mom passed away; you don’t mean this.”
“Fucking hell, Adelaide.” He screamed, “Stop using my mom’s death as an excuse when I don’t want you. This isn’t some fucking excuse to grieve on my own. Just leave, get out!”
“I’m nothing without you,” my palms fell to the hardwood floor. Each tear burned my eyes.Looking up at him, through the ache in my chest. “Just… Give me eight seconds.”
He did.
Christian let me look at him for eight whole seconds without breaking contact. Where was he? Where was my Christian?
I desperately searched his eyes and found nothing. Seven years of friendship. Six months of love. All of it went down the drain. But I stood there, holding onto that last dirty piece, pulling at it. Getting dirty with bloodied tears and lumpy goodbyes. I had to stay strong for him. I had to be there for Christian, not only because I loved him, but because he loved me, and I couldn’t let that go to waste.
You couldn’t replace love with someone else’s love, but you could always hug it and learn to lean into it. Love was uniquely individual and our love for each other was pure devotion.
In those eight seconds, my heart demented itself, becoming a figurative monster that only existed in fiction. Maybe this is what heartbreak feels like. It turns into a vicious creature with sharp teeth, hurting no one but yourself.
“You don’t need me to satisfy your feelings of loneliness,” he left me begging on my knees, bruised, broken, and croaking out his name over and over again. My tears and snot concocted together and produced a new version of heartbreak that swam through them before getting sucked up by the tips of my fingernails—the painful process starting all over again.
A sympathetic hand squeezed my shoulder. “Let me take you home, Adelaide.”
Osama’s warm voice brought a slither of comfort to the ice freezing my soul.
“It’s okay, I can go on my own. Just…” My knees shook as I stood. “Promise me you’ll take care of him.”
“As long as you promise me, you’ll take care of yourself.”
I gave him a sad smile.
Him and I both knew that taking care of myself was caring for Christian.
I squeezed his arm before walking out the door.
Behind me, a trail of humiliation and broken love left pieces of itself as I ripped away the part of me, I loved.