Out of some strange instinct you felt like texting the person that made you realize you’re gay. Maybe you needed the sensation of healed wounds. This is what she always made you feel: sympathy and connection stay. Wounds and the inflicted pain vanish. Always. If you let them heal. 

As you were talking to her, reminiscing and enjoying her way of being, which was always like a smirk - a sad one from time to time, but still a smirk – you figured you needed to take more care of your body. The occasional days without food and then days with loads of alcohol and pizza and sweets were not doing you good. And all that crying and the dehydration, too. 

Also there was a short circuit somewhere in the night and as you were undressing, the light bulb on your night stand and the charger of your phone went powerless. And it got dark and silent. This time it wasn’t scaring, it felt safe. No light, no messages, no alarm clock, no notification that you should have turned off already but couldn’t force yourself to do. Another night with very diffuse and strange dreams, but by now you were almost interested in what your brain would fabricate out of your worries and thought spirals.  

After the good talk you had, somehow you were able to clean up your room the next day. No idea where that came from, but you were happy about it. You lit your favorite scented candle, collected the accumulated glasses and plates and coffee mugs and then made your bed. When you looked out of the window, you could almost touch the huge maple tree which was moved by the wind, like it was running from one firm hug to another one. The wind on your skin made you notice that it was warmer than the last days. No sun today either, but the temperature had risen, was softer, was more gentle and not so stinging and hurtful.  

You could hear your flatmate making coffee and the anticipation hit you a little bit unexpected. The sound of boiling water. Clattering, that transported two heaped tablespoons of grounded cheap coffee into the French press, the clanking of trying to dust off any excess coffee from the spoon into the glass body. And the sound of the water being spilled into the brown powder with a slowly higher turning sound, climbing its pitches, until it had reached the desired volume. About a litre of coffee that took just three flatmates or two to empty. In a few minutes. 

Nature has cunning ways of finding your weakest spot, you thought. The soft stroke of the wind coming through your window urged to resurface a memory of lips, and the care and affection that went into the touch in that exact spot. 

Later that day you went on a walk with your flatmate. She kept stressing that she would love to have your problems because she had it so much worse. In some ways she was so utterly bad at consoling or empathy itself, you could have a jaw drop and a good laugh about it from time to time. 

Oh well, oh well. There she went. 

She’s not my ex, you thought. 

She rolls her eyes at you and sighs. Of course not. How could you assume elsewise?

This conversation started just because you went to the supermarket you cried in the day before yesterday. 

When you tried to pick out a good cheese, your glance got glued to the precut cheese cubes. How could precut cheese cubes be your kryptonite. How could they. That was a bizarre and heartwarming story. You had to think back to the discussion you had on whether cheese cubes were a snack. She said no, you said yes. And there they were sitting, grinning at you in their perfect little shapes. 

I hate my life, you said out loud and the guy to your left lifted his eyebrows and backed off. 

Your flatmate asked you why and kept trying to annoy you by poking your side. The times you explained to her friendly that she was supposed to please stop that because she was crossing your boundaries by touching you unannounced and unwanted – they had exceeded an imaginable number. So you just didn’t react to her. It worked. She stopped.

But then you remembered that the only person who understood you on that topic was now gone and you could not go to her and rant on how annoying your flatmate was being. This fact made you even angrier, so you just went to pay for the stupid cheese and waited outside. 

Today you weren’t sad. You were angry. Your therapist would’ve been so proud. And you were so angry.