Try Sleeping with a Broken Heart

I've talked about how one of the hardest parts of this break-up has been when I'm expecting to be distracted and I'm not. I talked mainly about work situations, but now it's creeping into friend time, too. I'm in Atlanta this week visiting my best friend whom I've known since sixth grace (picture matching baby-doll dresses and sunflower hats ala Clueless). She's going through a divorce, and she's starting to figure out her new life. I hate that it's happening to her--and that I'm going through this break-up--but thank God for a friend who really gets it.

The difference, though, is that she sees where things went wrong, and I really don't. I'm still so confused about all of it. We're not angry at each other. We don't hate each other. We didn't cheat, steal, or lie. How did things fall apart? When?

My friend was having computer troubles, and after many different tries, I couldn't get it to work, so I left SCL a message to see if he had any ideas. Now, this was only the second time I've contacted him since the break-up. I wouldn't have done it had my friend not been really desperate to fix it without having to spend oodles of money at Geek Squad who probably wouldn't have helped her anyway (and SCL has made me so anti-Geek Squad or anything of the like that I couldn't stand the idea of her going there.)

When he called back, I told him that I'd figured it out but thanks for calling. We chatted for a few minutes. It felt fine, normal. I hung up feeling fine. Later that afternoon, after doing some online apartment hunting for my friend, I felt exhausted, mopey, and needed some space. So I listened to some Alicia Keys (hence the title of this blog) and rested. But I couldn't get thoughts of our broken relationship out of my head: what happened between us? What went wrong?

After sharing a French-like dinner with my friend and watching the Sex and the City movie, I was exhausted and decided to go to bed, but not without first checking my email and facebook. I should've known better, but I logged into chat and saw SCL's name there. I don't know if it was the sparkling wine we'd had or what, but I sent him a message saying "good night." He wrote back "good night." Then I felt all of the emotion, the hurt, the pain rise up in me. I wanted to tell him everything, I wanted him to tell me everything, I wanted to be us again.

I resisted for the most part. I did say that it was hard not to say more and that I missed him. And he replied "I'm sorry." Not "I miss you, too." Not "This is hard for me, too." Just "I'm sorry." What are you sorry for? Sorry that I'm not over this? Sorry that you've put me through this? Sorry that you did this to me? What does "I'm sorry" mean?

Before it went any further, I shut my laptop, curled up in bed, and cried for an hour at least. I sobbed. The pain felt as raw and deep as it did nearly three weeks ago. Now that the shock has worn off, the hurt is really setting in, and I'm having more difficulty remembering that pain is normal, pain isn't crisis. That all sounds like bullshit to me right now. It's easy to say that in the first few days, but as the weeks go by and it's still hurting so much, I wonder if this is normal and if I'm ever going to get over it.

Part of me still wants my old life back, and that part of me of hates SCL for taking it from me.