Every so often you'll have a
fleeting flashback of the two of you together out of nowhere, usually something so
boring and
unmemorable that you can't believe it stuck out in your mind over all the other times you were with him. You try to remember every detail of the
Homecoming you took him to, but you know it's the little things like eating
brownies off his
kitchen counter and looking out his
window at the
moon while
hugging his arms around you that matter more than all the
dances and
anniversaries in the world. Your
sweatshirt still smells like him for days afterwards, and you swear even the
air in your room does once in a while.
The top drawer of your desk is packed with your compilation of things that remind you of him. If you could you'd collect everything in sight, but you can't, and so your mementos consist of love letters, pictures, gifts, movie ticket stubs, strawberry lip gloss, and the dried-up flower that still smells beautiful after all these months.
You stay awake all night debating on whether or not you should call him. In the end you always push the phone under the bed and try not to think about anything for the rest of the night except for reassurance that he's probably sleeping or on the phone with another girl and you don't want to bother him. There's never anything you can think to talk about anyway but all the "why"'s and "but"'s and "what if"'s and "how come"'s, and you know he's tired of hearing them.
"We'd better still be friends," he said, and you didn't know what to say so you just smiled and nodded. When you turned to leave his bedroom you thought about your initials he'd carved into his dresser that you'd seen a minute ago and your names still written inside the heart on his mirror. His forgetfulness to erase you from his memory hurts, but the real sting comes when you think of how that was the very last time you'll ever see his dresser and mirror, and knowing that you'll never call him at midnight or kiss him or hear him say "I love you" again makes you want to cry.
And sometimes you flirt with other people. Sometimes you miss his voice. Sometimes you're all grown up.