You wake up with a hollow feeling in your chest and your throat hurts from all the crying the night before.  You just want to curl up in bed and wrap yourself in your blanket and just wait, wait, wait until this feeling goes away.  It feels like your heart is in a vise and your whole body aches for him.  It really is over...forming those words in your mind starts a fresh wave of pain and tears fall down to the side of your face and then your pillow.

 

When you actually manage to get yourself out of bed, you sit on its edge and look around your room.  Every corner seems to remind you of happier times.  You check your phone to see if he has replied to your messages last night (if he can just please, please call you back and maybe you can works things out).

 

No messages, no missed calls.

 

It really is over.

 

The pain seems to have taken over and you clutch your chest while you cry your heart out.  It is miserable, but somehow it relieves you a little. 

 

"I can't do this anymore.  It's not like I'm being fair to you anyway." he gently said.  The night before was supposedly a celebration of the third year of being together.  Even if in the past year you have seen more of him on tv, youtube and the posters and cds that you bought but never opened.

 

You just sit there dumbfounded.  After everything you both have been through?Almost a year of pretending and hiding and lying so you can be together, this is what it has come down to?

 

"Oppa.  What is this really about?It's not like I ask a lot from you..." You can't bring yourself to beg even if your entire being is screaming and fighting to keep him.  This your Jongdae after all.  This was the boy who walked home with you everyday from school even if his house was on the opposite route. Who serenaded you whenever you got mad, held your hand and left you little notes of sweet nothings in your locker.  This was your Jongdae, your first kiss.

 

He dragged his hand down his face.  He looked really tired, and older.  You wonder, where is my Jongdae?

 

"You deserve someone better.  I can't take care of you the way I used to-" 

 

"I'm not a damn invalid.  I don't need you to take care of me.  I've been doing perfectly fine." You try so hard to keep your voice steady but it breaks and tears stream down your face.

 

"I know.  That makes it worse for me though,"

 

"Don't give me that bull.  Is it another girl?Are there so many throwing themselves at you now?Do they already know about us?Is the company pressuring you to break up with me?Or are the rumors true?Which one is it?Suho oppa?" 

 

That was a low blow and you know it. 

 

"I'm not listening to this.  I have to go." His face was a mask and his voice flat.

 

His voice.  Before you even knew his name, you heard his beautiful voice first.  Hearing him talk to you like this feels like your heart is being ripped out of your chest.  As he walks away, you run after him and desperately hug him from behind.

 

"Oppa.  Please.  Don't do this." You are sobbing so hard now, you barely choke the words out.  His shirt is ruined by your tears and you fear that you might bruise him as you cling to him tightly.

 

The both of you stand there like that for a while.  You cry and he stands there with his head down.  The tears subside after a while.  Your hiccups and your heart breaking into a tiny million pieces are the only sounds you hear.

 

He gently pries himself from you.  You stand there in shame, but there is also anger and love and hope and fear and pain.  He turns around and looks at you with eyes that seem to have aged a hundred years.  They were the saddest you have ever seen them and you feel weak because you knew, even before the words came out.

 

"I'm sorry.  But we need to end this already." His lower lip trembles and he bites them and he quickly turns and walks away from you and your life.

 

You hardly remember how you got home.

 

The sun is now shining through your window, but you feel nothing.  The world moves on, mocking you with the sound of chirping of birds and ongoing traffic, the smell of bacon from the kitchen and the sound of your mother's voice singing a tune from long ago. 

 

The world moves on but you are stuck, here and now.  Where is my Jongdae?

 

The door opens and you hear your sister asking for spare sanitary pads but you just lie down again and bury your face in your pillow.

 

"Unnie..." No words were spoken but she knew.  Your sweet, annoying little sister, cradling your head in her arms, crying with you as if it was her Jongdae that was gone. 

 

Where is my Jongdae?

 

Days will pass.  Weeks.  Months. 

 

Finally after what it seemed like the longest time of just surviving, you decide to try and live again.  You look different, feel different.  There is that constant hole in your heart but you move on and on and on and on and on. 

 

"Two years since you walked away from me

Since all of our scattered dreams

Were just thrown away

I'm finally gettin back to what I used to be

Share my pain with my family

Think I'm on my way"*

 

There are days when you allow yourself to stop thinking and you let yourself hope and that's when you crash.  Those are the nights when you cry yourself to sleep. 

 

"But sometimes I cry, babe

When I'm all alone

With this heart of mine

Sometimes I cry, babe

Although you've been gone

For a long, long time"*

 

It was your birthday when you receive a message.

 

"How are you?"

 

You stare at the screen of the phone and with trembling fingers answer the question with another question:

 

"Who is this?"

 

You have deleted his number a long time ago.  But in your heart you knew, just like that night when he ended things between the two of you.

 

"Can we talk?"

 

Three words were enough to send you back in an instant into that dark hole that you desperately and fiercely tried to climb out of when he left you.  Your Jongdae.

 

You sit still, eyes closed and your face towards the sky.  Before you even typed the words to reply, you already knew. Just like that night when he ended things between the two of you.

 

*Sometimes I Cry by Eric Benét