Broken Chapter 2

So scene opens. Picture an overweight, blubbering mess—hasn’t been washed or left the apartment in days. Not much in the way of food is evident, and a mountain of empty wine bottles from the local Tesco express. Bonus of staying in an apartment that’s above a supermarket when you’re going through the worse breakup imaginable.

How did I get here, you ask? A week before my boyfriend came back to our lovely penthouse apartment after a ten hour drinking session with his close female friend, at his wit's end. At this point in our relationship, I was a paranoid mess, constantly questioning him and berating everything he did. I guess after all that time, he just couldn’t take it anymore. I cried and accused, then I heard the words I had been dreading hearing for the past few weeks… "I’m done, I can’t do this anymore."

In that moment, my heart fell through my stomach and a cold pain came over. I literally felt my heart break. Like he had actually jammed his fist into my chest and ripped out my heart. Still five/six months on, I can still feel the ache. But we'll get to that at another point.

This is the aftermath.

One of my best friends was between apartments, luckily enough, that were just across the river from my apartment. I may have been stubborn enough to move out, but I was still the most broken I have ever been in my life. I spent almost two weeks there, not really leaving the apartment.

Except for the occasional trip to buy more alcohol or to go view houses in the last week. It was pretty ironic, the timing of the breakup, considering I had taken a holiday after leaving my last job to start a new one. Perfect fr*cking timing for my life to fall apart and me to look for somewhere new to live. Every day I looked out of my best friend’s apartment, smoking, looking into my own apartment, wondering why he wasn’t messaging me. Wasn’t he even remotely bothered? I'd occasionally blow up at him, writing long emotion and alcohol-fueled rants that I am really not proud of now; but in the moment, I thought it would help—bring him back. Ha. What a sad, pathetic f*ck I was.

I spent my days not really leaving the sofa. Binge watched Harry Potter and Sex in the City. It’d numb and distract me for a while. Then a couple or friends who showed their eternal love for each other would make me angry, I’d start shouting, "Yeah you’ve got someone who loves you, go on rub it in you pr*ck!"

Then I'd get upset, become numb, then the vicious circle would ensue. Crying, anger at crying, drinking, laughing, crying, numbness... repeat.

It is so tiring but funnily it created my breakup insomnia that I still haven’t lost. Its super fun when you have a stressful full-time job and an active social life.

The weeks that followed, my friends slowly bailed on me. Still now, we don’t have the same relationship. They’re still present in my life, but I must have been an unbearable bitch in and out of my relationship, so I really can't blame them.

That week, I started to go off the rails. The more hurtful things he said and the more I drank, I just wanted to feel nothing. I wanted to stop hurting. I downloaded tinder. Within a couple of hours and a couple of bottles rosé later, I’d already gotten a hook. A hot 20-year-old f*ckboy coming round to satisfy my needs and keep me distracted from my dark mind. It only took a few hours of raunchy sexts to get him over. It’d have been almost two months since I’d had any physical or emotional attention. I just wanted to feel something other than pain.

He turned up, beautiful, ripped 20-year-old f*ck boy. A million times out of my league. He looked like a rabbit in headlights as I opened the door.

We shall call this one "the child." I have nicknames for all of my conquests lately so my friends can keep track and I don’t get an emotional attachment. I won’t describe this one. There was no potential to date. We knew every time we revisited each other it was no more than the emotionless backup sex we needed at the time. He is one of those f*ckboys who is upfront about it. So I always knew where I stood with "The Child," so I have complete and utter respect for him.

I’m not going to get into the gory details, but it might have been one of the best sexual experiences I have ever encountered yet. It could have been the lack of sex for months or the fact he had by far the biggest penis I had ever encountered. Thick as it was long, and scary even flaccid. You could tell he went to the gym a lot and was proud of his body.

Thank god for the amount of wine I had consumed because, at the state of my mentality and body at that point in time, I wouldn’t have even been able to open the door. My confidence had been at an all-time low after the months of rejection and self-torment. I was probably at one of my largest weights.

I was well aware the child was a f*ckboy. I just rolled with the punches, had mind-blowing, emotionally detached sex, roughly about five/six times. The boy did not disappoint. We have had a few encounters since, always on his terms and when we’ve both got nothing better to do. In a low point, I guess. I know I wouldn’t be his first choice and he wouldn’t be mine. After the last time, I started to see he was just as damaged as me. I ended that behaviour some time ago now. I don’t miss the feeling after or the self loathing.

Anyway, the next day I was on a high from what I’d done, thinking I’m back to my old ruthless self. I’m over it quicker. I’m numb.

However, as the day crept on, the self-hate and crippling regret washed over me. By the night I was in floods of tears. Congratulations, you’ve done it again; well and truly f*cked up, and coincidentally made your vagina wider.

How could he ever forgive me now? I’ve slept with someone else within days, even feet from our apartment.

Nothing feels worse than the burning of heartbreak tears, when it's raw and recent they feel like hot, thick blood streaming down your face. Completely different from other years, when they are quite cold.

The days after would be a haze of working, drinking, and dating apps to distract myself. As long as I was busy and not thinking about him, I was fine. I could plod on pretending everything was okay, pretending I wasn’t breaking inside. I’d look over the pictures on my phone, obsess over messages we'd sent right from when we first got together till the days after the breakup.

If I had a chance to my own thoughts, I'd end up messaging him in floods of tears writing long emotional emails, texts, and trying to call him drunk. I’m surprised he didn’t block my number, to be honest. At the start, we’d talk about what was wrong, how much we loved each other, and how our lives were then with the pain. It gave me hope. It didn’t help that I went looking for it in the things he said.

Every time he acted distant or more over it than me, there was that pain in my chest. I had been getting heart palpations since the breakup. They probably went on till late December; randomly/emotionally. I could never tell when it was coming.

Sometimes there wouldn’t be a sign. I could be just sat there. I now know it was stress-induced anxiety. It’s quite scary when you’re just sat chilling and your heart starts bouncing out of your chest. You start panicking more. I’m not going to lie, in the beginning, I would hope that it was more than an anxiety attack. I didn’t want to die. I just wanted the pain to stop.

However, the worst pain I have felt is the ache from the hole in your chest where your heart used to be when your mind decides to remind you of the love you've just lost.

The body is a wondrous object, but its also a complete and utter bast*rd.