“Well, what do you want me to say?” The way he is looking at me makes me feel so small.

I take a deep breath, trying not to cry. “I want you to say that tonight was just a bad night, but that it doesn’t mean anything. I want you to say everything will be all right.”

“This just isn’t working out,” he says, squeezing my hand. “If anything, tonight is proof of that.” Jake says this like he is talking to a child, in an I’m-better-than-you type of way. The whole night he responded to me with two-worded answers, never letting me in past the wall he put up around himself. He did not once compliment me on how I looked; the only time he made eye contact with me was to crack a joke or tell me I was an awkward dancer. I had expected him to act differently on my Junior Prom night.

“I’m sorry,” he says without any real emotion. I breathe slowly trying to catch my breath.

“But...why? Why! We said we would try.” I manage this all in one breath.

“I know we said we would, but, Hannah, it’s just not working out. You know that.”

At this point the tears that were already streaming down my face turn into sobs, and I am gulping for air, my chest caving in on my lungs. I try to talk, but I cannot form words through my sobs. “I don’t want to!” I cry, wrapping my arms around his neck. “I don’t want to break up. Is this...are we breaking up right now?” I say this praying that he will say no, we are not, and that everything will be okay.

“Well, yeah,” he replies, sounding like he wanted to add “duh” to the end of the sentence.

I lose it. If I was sobbing before, I am having a full blown panic attack now. I can barely see or breathe or taste anything besides the snot running in the back of my throat. The music downstairs is beginning to overwhelm me. I feel suffocated and dizzy; I can barely feel my limbs. I throw my body into his, holding on as tightly as I can.

This is the last time I will ever hold him.

He hugs me back and whispers multiple apologies into my ear. He kisses my forehead and runs his hands over my hair and my back, chanting “I’m sorry” like it was his new mantra.

“What about Jazz Fest? And your prom? What about the beach trips we were going to take? What about your graduation?” I fire one question after another, not wanting to accept that our relationship is over.

“We can still do all those things. Maybe not the vacations but I still want to be in your life.”

“Wh- wh- when di- did you stop caring about me?” It takes all my effort to make the words come out as I hiccup. “When did you st- stop loving me?”

“Hannah,” he breathes my name gently like a whisper. What he said next broke me. “It was only puppy love. I’m sorry, but you know our relationship was mostly physical. We were only infatuated with each other.”

Puppy love?

I loved this boy. He treated me with more respect than any boy ever had. He called when he said he would; he picked me up at the right time. He always paid for dinner, never even letting my hand reach for my wallet. He pulled my chair out for me before taking a seat for himself, and when bringing me home, he walked around to the other side of his truck to open my door. He was outgoing and an amazing dancer. He shared my love for music and books and writing stories. He was beautiful, and when he smiled at me he made me feel special, like I was the reason he was smiling. He was not perfect, but he was perfect for me. When I began to learn of his many flaws, I accepted him for them. Jake made me a better version of myself, and he made me feel beautiful for the right reasons. I loved him for that. I hated him for this.

I was enraged. I had spent the last nine months of my life with him, and hearing the words puppy love hurt me more deeply than I could have imagined. Perhaps he was only ever infatuated with me, but who was he to tell me how I felt?

I am crying so much now, I can feel his T-shirt sleeve completely soaked in my tears. I say the only thing I could think of, the only argument I had left. I pull his face into mine, so my mouth is resting on his cheek by his ear. “But, I love you.” I say these words pathetically, but they are filled with hope. Hope that he will say he loves me back. Hope that he will admit he is not in love with me but he still loves me for the person I am.

Instead, I am met with pain in his eyes. He is not hurting for what is happening, but hurting because he did not want to be here. “I’m sorry” is all he says.

One of his friends calls him from downstairs, telling him it was time to leave. He turns and walks away from me without saying goodbye.

I collapse. I start heaving but there is nothing in my stomach to throw up. I stay like this against the wall for a few minutes, and I feel completely drained of all feeling except for pain. The next five hours consist of me going through two boxes of tissues and soaking my friends shirts with tears. When I go to sleep, I still wake up every thirty minutes hyperventilating.

I wake up at 5:30 that morning, finally giving up on any hope of sleep. I grab a blanket and wrap it around me, trudging downstairs while trying not to trip on the edges it. The house gives off an eerie feeling; any evidence of the after party from the night before is completely gone. I feel so alone, not wanting to wake my friends up knowing they went to sleep only an hour before. I wander around the house, opening random doors and occasionally falling to the floor. My head is killing me and I feel hungover, not from alcohol but from crying the whole night.

I am not broken. I am shattered.

Eventually I crawl to the porch and climb on to the bench swing, staring at the hedges along the fence. I try to keep my mind occupied, but all I can think of was his response when I said, “But I love you.”

*****

The months that followed prom were horrendous. I did not feel like living. Not because of him, but because of everything else in my life that I would now have to go through without him. I broke into tears multiple times throughout the school day, and I would snap at my friends when they told me I needed to socialize or eat. Looking at food made me dry heave like I did that night, and I would start having panic attacks at lunch. I looked and I felt like a skeleton. My friends tried to help me at first, but almost all social interaction brought back memories of him. I stopped talking to them about anything past a superficial level. I became obsessed with my weight and what I wore, and I loved being able to choose to not eat. That was the only thing in my life I could control.

Those months following my breakup were terrible, but today I am stronger and happier than I have ever been in my life. I am sure of myself and I know I am capable of so much more without him. He hurt me in so many ways, before and after we broke up. Sometimes I let that pain get the better of me, but eventually I let that pain make me tough. It took a long time to get to that point, especially when my feelings for him overpowered the logical side of my brain. I took baby steps, but now I can finally look back on our memories without the pain becoming fresh, like a Band-Aid being ripped off of an open wound.

However much Jake hurt me is how much more compassionate I became. I learned to not judge girls when they were heart broken. I realized it was hard to be myself when I identified myself next to a boy for so long. It took a very long time for me to realize it was okay to just be “Hannah.” I did not have to be Jake’s girlfriend or “Jake and Hannah”; I could just be me. I learned that I can only be beautiful if I am the judge of my own beauty, and that no boy has the right to determine my dignity. For the first time, I am demanding respect from everyone, and I am realizing I do not need a guy to make me feel important or happy. This is up to myself alone.

Life is not perfect, nor is it easy, and I am still dealing with this heartbreak. Instead of letting this pain make me weaker, I now use it as incentive to be stronger. Having my heart broken is what gave me hope that I will always be okay. No matter what hardships I will end up going through in my life, I know I am a strong person and I know beyond a doubt that I will get through it. Having my heart broken was the worst pain I have ever been through, but I would not be who I am today without it.