The Conditions of Will

by Jessa Hastings

“That God that my mom thinks she serves—he’s so much smaller than who I think the real one is. The real one—to me, he’s everywhere, in everything. And sure, maybe he speaks through the Bible. But also maybe he speaks through Narnia, and Harry Potter despite J. K. Rowling lately, and the trees, and science, and the stars, and black holes and the ocean and the way the sky looks sometimes, and you can feel it in your chest.”

You can’t avoid the avalanche of emotions that come with the termination of a relationship; you can only prolong them, which I refused to do. I looked every feeling I felt square in the eye and stared it down until it rolled over. The grief would come in waves, and I’d miss him on certain days, at certain hours, but for the most part, I had closure, because it wasn’t rejection and no one fucked up. We were in love and it didn’t work.