Five Minutes

I still have trouble breathing.
After two fucking years, I still have trouble breathing.
After two dry years, I find myself drowning in tears at three in the morning.

Fuck.

Maybe it's the pre-graduation jitters.
Maybe it's the post-exam anxiety.
Maybe it's just the loneliness.
But here I am, voicelessly screaming, asking for your presence beside me.

I know you're two continents and thousands of seas away;
I’m perfectly aware of that.

Is it so crazy to wish that somehow, when you take your coffee in the morning or when you read that ten year-old comic book, you'd remember that I'm still right here?

It has been six minutes – now seven – since I started staring at your name on my phone screen. It's just a touch away, you are literally only a touch away, but I know that I can't do it. I shouldn't. I would never.

It's not about pride, no. It's about moving on.

I know damn well that we should be moving on from each other, that we should start living our new lives, but for some odd reason, I'm willing to bet that a small fraction of you is doing just as badly as I am.

It isn’t two years since we broke up - that was ages ago. It is two years since we stopped talking.

How the fuck did I lose my best friend?

Did I say something stupid? Was – is – your girlfriend jealous of me? Did you outgrow me? Did we outgrow each other?

This is the classic "so many questions, so little answers" crisis. And we thought we weren't ones to oblige to the cliches.

We thought we had it our way.

We thought you'd call me right before you hop on a flight to go to uni and we'd talk until the air hostess tells you to shut it off. And you’d yell at me for calling them air hostess instead of flight attendant.

We thought you'd be there for my seventeeth birthday, and I'd be there for your twentieth.

Oh and speaking of - you didn't even wish me a happy birthday. You did last year, when I thought that we were completely done. With the little two-worded text, I thought at least we’d talk twice a year, even if it was only for birthdays.

Not this year, though. Not in the email, not on Twitter, not even on Facebook. Facebook. The most basic platform to wish strangers a happy birthday.

We thought we'd keep the promises that we made three years ago on the school rooftop, so fucking confident that nothing could possibly go wrong.

But then again, we also thought we'd make expensive international calls and say good morning at the wrong time. That certainly didn’t happen, so apparently we didn't think too well.

I suddenly have the strongest urge to slap our past selves so hard right now.

Why did you have to be the only person that I could talk to? Why did you have to be the only person in my life that can talk about penis jokes in one minute and be stupidly sentimental in the next?

Why did you have to be my person?

How did you?

One thing I know, is that you had all of your answers with you no matter what problem I came to you with. You just seem to know everything without even trying.

Maybe you googled some of it, maybe you didn’t, all I know is that it was easier to ask you than to search for the answer myself.

You told me how to handle my toothache with a dab of toothpaste. You also taught me how to talk to that one teacher that was always up our asses yet was so easily offended.

We would go to a strange restaurant and somehow, your food was always better than mine because I always insisted on picking my own food instead of listening to your recommendation. You’d still share it with me though, and sometimes when you were in an exceptionally good mood, you’d trade it with mine.

You were the first person who taught me how to reject boys nicely, for Christ's sake. It took me awhile to figure out that it was actually to open my door for you, but I didn’t mind.

Now that I'm wide awake with a math test waiting for me in four hours, I'd kill to have the chance to ask you, why am I freaking out?

If this happens back then, you’d tell me in a heartbeat. You knew me better than I know myself. You were able to tell whether I’m angry or sad from the slightest purse of my lips.

If we'll just talk again, even after two years of silence, I'm sure you'll be able to figure me out right away.

Why can't you answer me now? Where are you when I need you to tell me things? To tell me that freaking out is normal and everything's going to be okay?

I don't need my boyfriend back. I need my best friend back.

People don't understand the extent of you and I, but we do.

At least, I hope you do, because I sure know that I do.

That's why I don't understand why we're not talking. I don't understand why you're not picking up the phone. I don't even understand why I'm not.

The silly talks and pinky swears had all turned into empty promises, and people wonder why I'm so bitter.

Why I've been so negative about graduating.

It’s not that I'm being a pessimist, it's just that now, I'm not sure how many promises that I made with my friends I can actually keep.

Okay, yeah, maybe that's what being a pessimist is.

All I need is a hello, or a how you doing, or a smile from you, just to remind me that we knew each other once. Maybe a lifetime ago, but at least once.

I need to know that what we had didn't go in vain; we simply outgrew each other and life goes on. That promises aren't all bullcrap. That I will still be able to talk to my now friends after all this ends. That it's all going to be okay after high school.

Just a simple nod, a three-second Snapchat, or a poke on Facebook. Something.

Probably doesn’t even take more than five minutes.

That's all I need. That’s all I ask for.