Illustration by Raquel
We don’t talk. She can’t, so I won’t. And that’s it.
Which is why my heart thumped like my mother testing a watermelon when she showed up in my inbox. I took a deep breath to brace myself and read the subject line:
Invitation to connect on LinkedIn
Just like that, a form email from a website I don’t even use filled my ears with her voice and pushed my tongue against her crooked teeth. An automated message, practically anonymous, triggered the emotional memory of a hundred emails breathlessly written, dizzily read.
If I search her name in my Gmail account, I’ll find all those notes with YouTube links and articles. I’ll find the photos my friend Caleb took of us for his class project, the ones that show how in love I was even before I knew it. I’ll...
Audrey, this is beautiful and heart wrenching and totally worth pausing the Season 5 Premiere of Gilmore Girls!!!
This made tears spring up in my eyes before I even got to the paywall. It was the push I need to finally become an A+ member! I’m still healing from a breakup and sometimes I like to walk up to a story like this to let the pain of it hit me again, though other weeks if someone so much hints at anything having to do with heartbreak (sorry, Tegan & Sara, I dunno if I can ever listen to you guys again).
Audrey, this was really beautifully written and totally spoke to my broken heart — “We don’t talk. She can’t, so I won’t” hit me so hard and I hope writing this gave you an alternative way to work through the loss of the relationship when you can’t talk about it with her.
So poignant and beautiful. <3
Gawd, Audrey, I just stopped breathing for a minute there. I had to remind myself to breathe, reading this, feeling it.
I randomly went looking for a chain of emails between me and the first girl I had girl-sex with the other day, in an old email account I don’t use anymore. I went looking because I was thinking of her and I realized that I couldn’t recall her last name. I can remember the smell of her and the freckles on her arms and the movie we were watching, but not her last name. Well, my super-old email account still existed and after going through a labyrinth of password reset steps, I got in there and found…all my old messages had been auto-deleted years ago. I don’t know why it even matters. I guess it doesn’t. But it was so sad. I felt so sad that I could never get it back. What is the interweb for, if not for keeping these thin, electric strings of connection to our lost lovers.
Anyway, thank you for writing this, that so many of us can relate to in some way.
This is beautiful too. Where is the line between honoring and haunting, with memory…or is it all blurred?
KaeLyn, I can’t imagine how i would feel if I suddenly couldn’t get all those emails back. These time capsules can be hell, but so necessary too.
Oof, this got me. It still throws me when I dream of her and then wake up realizing that we’re complete strangers 4 years later.
This is so beautiful and honest and spoke to me. Thank you so much for sharing!
Oh Audrey –
You hit me hard with this one. It’s so beautiful.
I’m going through a breakup and your words remind me that all this intensity I’m feeling isn’t just my crazy ex-girlfriend brain at work.
Thank you so much for putting my thoughts into words. <3
I’ve been with my person now for eleven years. Which means all my previous relationships predate my Facebook and Gmail and Instagram. I have some letters and photo albums and an actual mix tape in a box in the attic. I am Facebook friends with all my exes but our Facebook friendship has only ever been as friends. I didn’t realize how complex the cloud relationship strings are – thanks for this beautiful piece.
Oh, my heart…
Yes, yes, yes. I feel like my story is so similar that I could have written this, but you put it so much more beautifully than I ever could. Thank you
Ugh. I love you.
ditto. sigh.
y’all are the stars of my heart <3
So many feels right now about past persons you guys. Jeez…Audrey that got my heart pumping and my breathing stopped for a sec or two. Its so beautifully written its painful. I feel like its a thing I should send my former self. Not that I would change what I have now though..
Im sure a lot of us were at a time like this. Saving things…not looking but seeing. Hearing and trying not to listen. There are memories that will always be painful. Songs that will seem like they remind you..little things that pop up when you least expect it.
Sometimes silence is what burns the bridges that we have.
Thank you for this. I read the opener and immediately bought an A+ membership.
I’m 3 weeks post-breakup/rejection, and hurting like hell. I’m mourning almost 10 years of loving a person more deeply than I ever thought possible. She was the one who taught me what healthy love and trust should feel like, and also the one who opened my eyes to my queerness. Like you’ve described, she’s left little reminders of herself braided all through my life, and it feels like I can’t take two steps without walking right into the pain of remembering.
I’m afraid I’ll never really move on from her. I can’t imagine loving anyone so completely, ever again. It’s good to know there are others who understand and it’s not just me.
I know these feels and you put them into words so eloquently. Thank you. <3
This was so true. Thanks. I’m not sure I was ready to read this, but I needed it. So honest and beautiful.
This was truly touching. And this is why I’m relieved that my partner of three years who I just left was not a tech/internet person. Wow.
I’m not sure if I’ve ever read something on AS that has resonated with me on such a deep, visceral level. The break-up this brings to mind for me isn’t recent but in this moment, it feels as if it just happened all over again. I remember having to go to such lengths to digitally separate from my ex (burying photos of the 2 of us deep in iPhoto, unfollowing her & her friends on all social media platforms, etc.). Long-distance relationships especially seem to breed this digital trail that is so, so onerous to scrub – you can’t just take all the digital objects that remind you of her and put them far in the back of your closet like you could with physical things such as letters and gifts and the like. Technology is such a double-edged sword.
Like a couple of other people have said, I read the first few lines and finally sprung for the A+ membership I’ve been promising myself for weeks…anyway.
This cuts so deeply for me. I’m still reeling from a situation (:/) I had with somebody a while ago, and I think part of why it’s been so tough for me is that on Facebook, on Twitter, they’re *almost* right there, like I could *almost* reach out and touch them. Even though I can’t. Even though I won’t. I could live it all again if I just scrolled down far enough in iMessage. So.
This was really lovely, thank you so much for sharing it.
This made my heart pound a little bit. I think it’s a little scary how much I can relate to this, down to random details.
This is kind of an older post now but one that (apparently like a few others here!) really made me want to join A+ when I saw the preview.
I’m a year post-breakup and it STILL stings and this captured it beautifully. Especially:
“I might need a reminder that I have a beating heart after all.”
Sometimes I think I torture myself with the digital reminders (facebook is the worst) and the memories because I need a reminder that I felt all those amazing feels (particularly for a woman). That I was with someone, that she liked me, was attracted to me, that she thought me desirable enough. It’s a spiral of self-loathing that I shouldn’t indulge, but it’s difficult not to.
Oh my gosh. All the feels..
sigh
I’m so honored to know you and call you a friend, bee, cabinmate. <3
I don’t think any piece of writing ever made me cry so much. I’m still crying. <3