The Break-Up Pact

by Emma Lord

“Take that picture and I will throw your phone so far into the ocean you’ll start getting texts from Poseidon.”

Same

It was the bone-deep and immediately crushing realization that so much of what I thought I knew about my life was wrong.

Back then it felt like the grief would swallow us whole. It’s different now, more like the waves at our feet—constantly ebbing and flowing, swollen one moment and quiet the next. A tide I can dip my feet into and let myself feel, or a swell that will hit me from behind when I least expect it.

buoyed

“I’ll text you the address for scream poetry tomorrow.” The grin that erupts on my face seems to spread right into Levi’s, whose eyes crinkle with delight. “Perfect,” I say. “I’ll be the one in the giant earmuffs holding a warrant for your arrest.” Levi nods. “It’s a date.”

Cute

“Are you sure you want to work for Fizzle?” I grumble. “Because New York is that way, Gossip Girl.”

And it’s strange, because it’s almost like he’s asking for something else. Like he’s asking me to flip my heart over, to show him the underside of it, that secret part where you keep things tucked away long after other people forget them.

It made me appreciate that life is both too short and too long for being something you’re not.

“I don’t think anyone ever gets to be settled in life. I think you just find people who weather it with you.”

“Anytime I felt out of place, I would think of you. Something funny you might say. And then I didn’t feel so out of place anymore.”

It’s like my entire life, I’ve only ever had the taste of something described to me, and now I’m finally taking my first juicy, absurdly rich bite.

I am somehow both lost and found, somehow outside of my own body but more myself than I’ve ever been.

I’ve always loved waking up with the sun on my face. I love waking up with it on Levi’s even more.