I got back in my car, starting the engine, then drove off. It wasn't until I pulled onto the highway that it all really sunk it, how temporary our friendship had been. We'd been on our breaks, after all, but it wasn't our relationships that were on pause: it was us. Now we were both in motion again, moving ahead. So what if there were questions left unanswered. Life went on. We knew that better than anyone.

So I just decided to relax into it, bumpy and crazy as it might be, and try for once to just go along for the ride.

Some things don't last forever, but some things do. Like a good song, or a good book, or a good memory you can take out and unfold in your darkest times, pressing down on the corners and peering in close, hoping you still recognize the person you see there.

I reached up with my finger and traced the scar over my eyebrow, remembering when that was the greatest hurt I'd ever known.

It was such a weird thing how a breakup stretched much wider than you expected. You didn't just lose a person, but their entire world as well.

I'd known enough people for every minute of the day, and yet still didn't have anyone as my two a.m.

I was tired of hanging on, taking the torn pieces to make something whole with them.