I asked him for some time to think about being friends. I wished someone would tell me what to do. My friends advised me to cut him off forever. I drafted a text that read, “It feels like I have to go back into Plato’s cave and learn to be happy there after experiencing the outside world for the first time.” I didn’t send it.
I went for a run. As usual, I thought about Tom the whole time. I felt so tired of myself. The houses in my neighborhood had the same Halloween decorations as when we had started dating the previous year. We had walked around together to look at them early one Thursday morning on our first real date.
Riding the endorphin wave of my fast last mile, I had a relaxing thought: There was no right thing to do. There was only what I was going to do.
I imagined a future after Tom and realized I had been living it for a long time. He occupied so much space in my head, but so much else — my friends, my parents, my research, school, books, art, things that made me laugh and things that made me feel cozy and loved — filled my every day. I had rebuilt my life. I had gone through the worst-case scenario, had asked the worst questions and heard the worst answers, and I wasn’t broken. I was OK.
That Friday was a year and one week since meeting Tom, and I texted him saying I did want to be friends. Sending that brief message was one of many items on my afternoon’s to-do list, and I did so quickly, liberated from the anguish and anger that had so often accompanied our communication. Then I set down my phone and went on with my day.
Marina Martinez is a medical student at Stanford University.
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