Let’s rewind.

I was the girl who would spend hours writing poetry about the boy of her dreams. Each breath I inhaled was his and every heartbeat of mine belonged to him. My interests were no longer important because he was important. His hobbies were my main priority and his favorite music genre became mine. His slang was the vocabulary my mouth reiterated with his borrowed tongue.

I was a reflection of this boy and it took so long for me to realize I am not a mirror.

So when this boy left me, I did not know what to reflect on. So I became lost and alone. I looked for love in the neighborhood boys and the jocks who treated me like the footballs and soccer balls they played with, because I was only their "practice." Many nights I laid in the beds of men and even by their side, I never felt more lonely. This was because I was not meant to be someone important or influential in their lives. I was merely there to pass the time before something better came along. I did not care because all I wanted was a warm touch but all I got were icy cold hearts and soft bed sheets.

So when the neighborhood boys and jocks grew tired of me, I grew tired of feeling empty. So my fingers became engaged in the neck of liquor bottles. My throat burned at first, but it wasn't as painful as the cracks in my heart. So I continued to drink until my throat no longer burned and my heart no longer ached, and all I could think of was...him. It didn't help like the books and the poems and the movies and the quotes said. They all lied. For the alcohol may have numbed the pain, but he still traveled through my head faster than the speed of light. And I swear to God, my physics teacher would argue that there is nothing like the speed of light, but if only he could look into my brain.

Please take a breath before it’s too late and don’t do what I did.

It takes less than a second to breathe and less than ten to recollect your ideas. I know so many new things are happening and spinning your life out of control. It’s overwhelming. Your thinking space seems to have condensed and become cluttered. Is it still too hard to breathe? I remember your pain. I remember trying to work through the moments of despair because the darkness swallowed your entire existence. I remember how much you blamed yourself for all the heartache he inflicted on you.

“Did I miss something?”

“Am I not pretty enough?”

“Is she prettier and better than me?”

“Does he still love me?

I asked myself these questions so many times, the script in my head began to play on repeat automatically. I laid in bed wondering why this other girl was a better option than me. I hated her. I hated a person I had never met because she was able to intertwine her fingers with his and I couldn’t. While I was dreaming about being with him, he was busy placing his fingertips around her waist. I couldn’t get the image out of my mind. I wondered how I became Alice falling down the rabbit hole when it came to loving him. As I wandered through my brain to find all the reasons to hate him, I could only find all the reasons why I adored him.

It is still such an awful feeling to know that my life was influenced by him. He made me feel breathless in every sense possible. And when I say breathless, I mean I could feel the air being sucked out of my lungs as I scratched my neck gasping for oxygen. He was my greatest passion, my favorite hobby, my fantasized dream, and I was just his toy to fiddle and pick at until I was torn.

I want you to know that it’s not your fault. I want you to know that he doesn’t even know your favorite color nor your favorite song. He doesn’t even know you were a writer because his only interest is himself. I know your heart is broken and after such a long time of sorrow, your soul feels mistreated. And I know it’s such a crappy line but it really does get better with time. So please take a moment to relax and realize it was inevitable but that it’s not the end of the world.

Don’t forget, he may not have loved you, but I always will.