Listen to My Heart

FALL

I always thought that it was a bunch of crap that you could look into someones eyes and know exactly what they were thinking. How you can just see it in the reflection of the light off their irises or their pupils, or how the color of their eyes would turn darker as if that meant something significant. I never expected to be able to look into someones eyes and just know what they were feeling; their emotions they were trying so hard to keep hidden. I didn't know until I looked into Tony's green eyes, and didn't see what I had always seen in them.

His eyes were cold, dark, and indifferent. A horrible contradiction to the sparkle and laugh that usually lit them up when he was with me. The green that I usually loved to see, seemed stormy, like the color of the sky before the storm rips apart anything in its path. When I looked into his eyes across the table from me, I didn't see any part of my best friend or my boyfriend. All I saw was nothing, and to me, that was a million times worse than any sort of anger or sadness.

"How was your day?" I asked him as I chewed softly on the macaroni and cheese I had quickly thrown together.

"Fine." He told me before looking back at the TV across the room. I pursed my lips and tried to hold back the irritation flaming within my chest.

"That's good." I spoke to fill the silence. That was something I had been doing a lot of lately; filling the silences that had once felt so comfortable, but now ripped me apart as if the lack of sound would make it easier for him to leave. To leave me and move on with his life.

That's how I had been feeling lately. Like I was holding on to the cliff for the both of us. As if I was walking on egg shells and trying so hard to keep it together when Tony was doing nothing at all.

"So I was thinking that maybe we could go up to Duluth for the day or something on Saturday." I spoke after chewing a bit more of my dinner. "Maybe we could go to Gooseberry falls. I'm sure it's beautiful with how the trees are changing color right now."

"Can't. I have work outs this weekend." He spoke without even turning to look at me.

"Oh, I didn't know that." I bit the inside of my lip, looking at the defined curve of his jaw and the way his teeth were set so his mouth was pressed into a thin line.

"Yep." Was his only response to me. I took in a deep breath and resisted to push it out in a sigh. When I invited him over for dinner tonight, I didn't expect him to walk in with a bad attitude. But how could I have expected anything else when he has been acting like this since June.

School ended and I began to work every day at both of my jobs, leaving little time for Tony. Yes, I felt bad that I couldn't give him the time he constantly wanted from me. For the first few weeks, he would constantly beg me to take time off, or let him bring me lunch to work. I kept refusing, not wanting to set a bad precedent with my bosses or co-workers, but also because I desperately needed the money. When Tony wasn't begging to see me at work, he was begging me to go up to his family's cabin for a weekend of relaxation. Every time I said no, and every time, Tony pouted his disappointment. Until August.

Every thing changed in August.

Summer work outs ended and so did summer school. Tony turned 21 and we all went out to one of the several night clubs in Minneapolis. We danced and drank and drank some more, and I barely noticed the way Tony didn't pay attention to me all night. After all, it was his day wasn't it? But Kara noticed, and she also noticed the way he seemed to turn a cold shoulder whenever I talked. She noticed his eye rolls when I talked about work, or my one bedroom apartment, or the internship I was hopeful to get in the Winter months.

And when Kara finally confessed these things to me, I started to see it too. I felt it in his touch, and started to see the change in his eyes that I never even thought could exist to begin with. I saw it every time I said no to him, and felt it even more when he just stopped asking all together. I felt like I was being punished for being a regular college kid. I had to work; Tony couldn't. I needed to bust my ass in school, while Tony's first priority always seemed to be hockey. But mostly I was hurt because he made me pay for being a responsible adult.

It's now October, and each time I see him, I can feel him slipping through my fingers faster and faster. What is even worse, is that the more I try to tighten my grasp on him, the more he thrashes to try and get out of my grip.

"Okay, well maybe we can go this summer instead." I resolved about Duluth. "It would probably be nicer and not as cold with how the wind blo-" I was cut off by the harsh scraping of Tony's chair across the kitchen floor as he stood, throwing out the rest of his dinner before rinsing his bowl in the sink.

"Tony-"

"I'm not happy." He blurted, his eyebrows pulled down low over his eyes as if he was concentrating or angry. I was quiet for a moment, trying to ignore the sense of dread that was attempting to drown my body into misery. I refused to shrink down in my chair.

"I never see you anymore! You don't even make an effort to be with me, and when we do finally get together after weeks or not seeing each other, we sit here like this.' He gestured to the table, his chair that was shoved far from the table. "We sit in silence, or talk about boring things that don't matter, dancing around what is so ridiculously obvious. We're nothing like we used to be. We don't have fun together, we don't talk to each other, and we're constantly tip toeing around." I was quiet, stunned into silence by the harshness in his voice and the same cold look in his green eyes, he wasn't talking to me like he was talking to his girlfriend, he was talking to me like a stranger.

"After all that, you still have nothing to say to me?"

"Tony, I don't know what to say!" I exclaimed, trying to sound like I was in control when I was afraid he could hear how bad I was shaking by the sound of my chair quaking against the floor.

"Because you know I'm right." He folded his arms across his chest. I felt the backs of my eyes stinging as I tried to grab onto him before he was gone completely. I reached my hand out to him but he shook his head at me. "Don't." Was all he said to me as he looked around my apartment, anywhere but at me. My bottom lip started to quake and the tears filled my eyes.

"I don't know what you want me to say." I finally said, my voice shaking like my lip. "I don't know how to make this better, or how to make the pain stop, Ton, I just don't." A tear slipped from my eye and I wiped it away furiously.

"Yes, you do." He spoke quietly, his gaze fixated on the floor. "We both do."

"How can you just let go of us?" I asked him, my voice breaking with my heart.

"Because there isn't anything left to hold on to." The harsh reality of his words felt like a slap to my face.

"So you're saying it's easy for you to walk away because you don't love me?" I asked him, my eyes burning with anger and tears, and a million other emotions that were impossible to recognize.

"No. Brianna, I love you, I will always love you. But that doesn't mean we should still be together." He looked like he was going to cross the room to me, to wrap me into his arms but he didn't. He stayed there with his butt against the counter, arms crossed, and that same cold, indifferent look in his eyes, like this wasn't killing him. "I can't keep doing this. I care about you so much, but I just can't. And I know you want more from me, I know you want me to try, but I just can't give that to you. I wish love was enough but it isn't, and I can't express how sorry I am that it's not." I felt a sob slipping up my throat and I held it inside, not going to let him hear how much this was killing me.

The same silence Tony had been talking about filed the room. I couldn't even breath as I looked down at my hands folded together tightly in my lap. Tony didn't move or make a sound, and I begged my brain to figure out what to say, what to do. But in the end I knew what I should do. If he wanted to go, I needed to let him go, no matter what it would do to my heart. I looked up at him, seeing the resolution in his eyes and the way he stood, across the room with his arms crossed, completely closed off. I pushed out a breath, but said nothing. Tony knew because he reached into his pocket, pulling his keys out,

"I'm going to go." Was all he said before he turned from the room and walked out the door. There was nothing left to say. No I love yous, no hugs or kisses, not even goodbye. Just the cold sound of the door closing.

I watched him slip through the door, holding on desperately to the last amount of my pride. I would not grovel. I would not get down on my knees and beg him to stay. I refused to run down the hallway and ask if we could still be friends because after having him like I had, we could never be just friends again. Just as badly as I wanted him to leave so I could fall apart, I also wanted him to stay and keep me together. I wanted him to be the glue that held the pieces of my shattered heart together. But he didn't want that, and no matter if it was different than what I wanted, I knew it was what I needed and what he needed as well. He needed to leave, to go off and do whatever it was he thought was better than being with me.

I slid off my chair as the tears fell down from my eyes, My head pounded from holding it together for so long, and the sob that I had choked into my throat ripped from my body and made me convulse. I cried like letting the tears out would make it all better. I sobbed and held onto my heart like that could keep the fragmented pieces together. But when I had finally cried myself out, my heart was still broken and everything was still complete shit.

I pulled myself up off the floor, not understanding how the sun could have set while my world was crumbling apart. How could the world keep on turning when I couldn't even breath without feeling the horrible pain in my chest. My thoughts turned to Tony, wondering what he was doing. I'm sure it was easy for him. He was the one who wanted out; he got to be rid of me, free and happy, while all I was left with was a miserably broken heart. I'm sure he was with his teammates now, laughing and drinking, already on to the next broad who could take my place on his arm. Just the thought made me lash out and punch the refrigerator next to me.

The pain ripped through my hand and up my arm a second later. I cried out and felt my eyes burn as new tears formed from the pain shooing up my arm.

"Fuck." I sobbed, wondering why I was being such an idiot. How could I have not seen us deteriorating? And what kind of moron punched a refrigerator anyway?

A knock sounded on my apartment door as I crawled my way into a standing position. I looked down at my hand, seeing how puffy my knuckles were but also the way my middle and ring fingers didn't look quite right. I tried to curl my hand into a fist and cried out again. Great, broken. I moved to the door, trying to wipe the tears off of my face. When I swung the door open, Kara stood there, a worried expression on her face.

"Oh honey." Was all she said before I burst into tears all over again.

That night, Kara brought me in to Urgent Care where they did x-rays on my hand. My fingers were indeed broken along with a few other bones in my hand. I had to go back in later in the week to get a cast on. While we waited for the doctor and the x-ray results, Kara and I talked about what happened earlier in the evening. She was quiet and listened, but she didn't say anything about it begin a surprise or call Tony any names. All she said was that in the end, it would be okay. I knew she was right, but at the moment, okay seemed like light years away from what I was feeling.

We spent the rest of the night sitting on my couch watching movies and eating ice cream. Kara fell asleep half way through Mean Girls, a carton of ice cream still in her hand. I shut the movie off and grabbed the cartons of ice cream, putting them in the freezer. I cleaned up the pop cans and threw away the tissues strewn about the place. I went to the bathroom and looked at my puffy eyes. My broken hand was a perfect partner for my broken heart. My mouth began to crumple and my eyes started to tear. A sob escaped my lips as I clutched at my heart, wondering how I was ever going to face Tony again. What would I say if I ran into anyone in his family? I shut the bathroom door, not wanting to wake Kara and have her come comfort me. I thought about crying for a few minutes and then pulling myself back together, but decided against it. I wanted to sob my heart out even if it didn't alleviate the pain.

Because sometimes, a girl just needs to let it out. And after losing my best friend and my boyfriend in one night, now was one of those times.