You're sitting in the middle of your bedroom floor listening to your significant other's favorite playlist on repeat. The same songs play over and over. One song sounds like a bunch of jumbled words, but you manage to make out, "I loved you once [something about] the summer sun. Stealing away..." something, something, something. The songs seem to drag on and, honestly, you stopped listening a while ago. You ask them why they like these songs so much. They tell you these songs remind them of you. Flattered by what you think is a compliment, you stare. Their eyes are closed and their breathing syncs with the music. You don't realize what is to come in the near future.

Flashback to reality.

You're sitting on that same floor. This time, you're surrounded by the loudest silence, and you're alone. So why did they leave?

One thing you never realized about this person is that they were always running, or at least getting ready to. You thought they were in it for the long run, and you didn't think they'd ever stay gone for good. See the thing was, you held on a little too tight. It made them nervous. Now, I'm not saying that it's your fault that they left, but they just weren't ready for someone like you. Every time they'd get closer to leaving, you'd be sure to follow them on their way out. One day they made an abrupt turn and left you clueless without any sense of direction. One might say you just loved the wrong person, but I don't believe there's such thing as a "wrong person"--just misdelivered ones. Some people are like a wrong number dialing, others are missed calls, missed opportunities. I'm getting sidetracked and a little cliche, but my point is, don't overthink it. Don't try to decipher it like you're a part of the CIA. They didn't need a million reasons to end it, just one. You'll spend days, years, even lifetimes looking for more reasons to justify their actions, but they're gone. Don't look at it as giving up on a friendship or relationship. Just come to terms with the fact that you tried your best while someone lacked appreciation and took you for granted.

I know what you're thinking, you looked at them like they were a rose when everyone saw them as a dandelion. How could your stars align so perfectly some time ago for you two to just not work? You wonder if they're happier now, maybe even in love. You start to wonder if maybe your timing was a bit too early. Maybe they were planning for something farther in the future. Maybe they really weren't ready. Maybe had you waited a few extra minutes before leaving, things would have been different. Maybe it would have saved some heartache and you two would have never met, or at least not yet. Again, all these maybes won't do you any good. "Maybe" won't change anything or bring them back to you right now.

Right now, you're confused between what's past and present. You're longing for something new, something spontaneous, but still longing for what's long been gone--for something you know isn't coming back. You're still planning moments around them; you're planning for a now that they just won't be a part of. Since they've left you feel like you lost all certainty in your life. That certainty was close behind when they walked out the door. There's no euphemism for the way you still feel about them that will do it justice. It's just you miss them and you don't know when it stops. You just have to keep reminding yourself that someday it has to.

So when does it get better?

I heard somewhere that every seven years our cells die and are fully replaced by new ones. Disclaimer: this doesn't mean seven years from now all of your cells are going to die and regenerate, but slowly they'll die and you will make new ones over time. Sort of like the memories you have with them. The memories will be pushed to the back of your brain, possibly for good, and you'll make new ones. Perhaps, happier ones. So today you're twenty-two, patiently waiting for twenty-nine.

Twenty-nine will be an age where your body will no longer remember their touch enough to crave it. At twenty-nine your eyes will not look for them in a crowded room, but instead for whoever it is that you came with. Twenty-nine is when you will no longer remember the smell of their skin. Your mouth will not be filled with the overwhelming need to scream in the night for them to come back. You will have a heart that no longer beats for them. At twenty-nine the person that loved them, will no longer exist. You'll know that person will be pronounced dead and you can remove the missing person's signs for them and your peace of mind because one won't be coming back and you'll have found the other. Twenty-nine will be the age you fully understand how magical it was to love them and appreciate the madness that came with missing them. Twenty-nine will be an age that you will no longer hear their name in every gust of wind, not even a whisper in the breeze. Every love song on the radio will feel less heavy, as will the burden. As will their absence.

One day you will no longer cry because of this. One day you will know where you stand because someone you love will never make you question your place. One day their name will no longer come up in conversation as the one who broke you. You will no longer need to choke it down as it burns the inside of your throat. One day you will be sitting on that same bedroom floor with eyes closed and breaths syncing with the music, because at twenty-nine you will be new. You will have a new body that they have never touched or spoken to.

My point is, it will take time, but one day you won't love them anymore.