Need—that’s a funny word. There was a time when I thought that I needed him like I needed oxygen, that everything would come crumbling down if I wasn’t able to call him every night before bed, every time I had a fight with my mom or bombed an exam. It was a naïve, childlike understanding of what it meant to love someone, because the truth, as it turns out, is that you don’t need anyone. You can love them with all your heart, but you don’t need them. When they walk away, you don’t stop breathing. The world keeps spinning, and life goes on.