Moving Past Heartbreak (Lesbian)

Once a week, my boyfriend can respond to my emails. Not call or text, but email. It’s the only way we can communicate. Missionary programs are pretty strict like that. The one that Nathaniel is in is so strict that he can’t read anything unless it’s the Book of Mormon, play any games unless they’re board games, listen to music unless they’re hymns… you get the point.

In the last year, I tried to make him less bored by emailing stories I found online or telling him what was going on in my life. Fuck, I even sent him pictures of me — a short, grey dye-haired tomboy standing 5’4” at nineteen years old — whenever I felt cute enough to take them, which was rare. I thought he’d appreciate seeing what I look like now and how I’ve been doing, even if he sent back one-sentence replies. Or emailed back every other week.

Come the second Monday in the chilly February, I sent him an email entailing the list of good things that happened to me in the last two weeks — I won over a hundred dollars at the casino, found my favorite mint ice cream after hunting it down for so long, etc. Within a few hours, I got a response from him. I get the usual ‘wow, that’s really good for you’. And then my eyes read the following:

“I will probably bring you with bad news and I have been thinking about this for the past month or two and that is… I don’t think we should talk and I don’t think we can be together anymore I have just felt like that for the past 2 months which is why I haven’t replied or sent you very many emails. Sorry bye.”

That’s it. Two months. Two months? TWO Fucking months??? There’s no explanation, no tact, and no emotion. It’s the last time he talks to me and hasn’t responded since. Not even to answer my “what the fuck?” email that follows soon after.

You wanna know how I spend the week in response to the email? Curled up in my bed, blankets over me, and distracting myself with a Shrek marathon while tears come down my face and leave my mascara’d eyes puffy. By the end of the week, my hair becomes an oily nest. That can’t be good for the dye.

I should be the bad bitch and say, “I’m an independent human being, and I don’t need that kind of attitude in my life!” I should be spending my time recovering at a bar, drinking my feelings away, and moving on by day two. I’m sure I have my fake id somewhere. Nathaniel doesn’t have that much power over me, so why should I act like he does?

The answer is simple: my humanity never got the message, and also, his tactless words hurt.

The email is also unexpected. We’ve known each other since we were tweens and always liked each other. We only made our feelings known in the last year, right before Nathaniel left for the mission. I thought we were compatible enough without being the same person or too different to function. We liked the same video games, had similar opinions on one topic, completely different ones on another, and had a decent flirt-to-roast ratio. I was the wild one in the friendship-turned-relationship, and he was the tamer of the two of us.

Literally, I had a relationship where the boyfriend was nice, respectful, and slightly boring, and I wanted that. I was willing to wait until he came back and then… I don’t know, we’d get married. I know, talking about marriage between people who are barely hitting their twenties is a bad idea. It wasn’t at the time. Guess I was willing to stay on the same page for two years while he wanted to read ahead without me.

By the time I pull the blankets off me, my bedroom is dark and cold from the open window. I stretch out a hand to close it. Once the cold stops coming in, I instinctively touch my necklace, which is one of his only gifts to me. It’s a silver bunny head, and it serves as my lucky rabbit’s foot. Apparently, the luck ran out.

I charge my phone and walk out of my room. I’m wearing the same black tank top and pajama pants as the last few days; it wasn’t like I went anywhere, nor do I plan on going out anytime soon.

Heading into the kitchen, I pull out a mug and get the water boiling in the kettle. Despite living on my own for the last five months, I’m as quiet as a mouse out of habit. The cupboard doors close noiselessly as I get out tea bags. My large feet step on the floor without the creaky boards singing the song of their kind. The slightest change of tune from the kettle prompts me to turn it off before it fully whistles.

This sounds like I constantly had to walk on eggshells while living with my parents, but they’re the lightest sleepers in the world. There have been so many times I got into trouble for waking them up at three in the morning because I wanted a “midnight” snack.

The leaves dance in the bag as the water pours through it. As I fill up the cup, the tea settles and stains the water into caramel brown. Mmm, caramel brownies sound delicious right about now. Do I still have some?

A quick check reminds me that I ate them all last week, right before the Email. How convenient. I’m already searching, so I may as well look for other snacks to munch on.

One of the cupboards makes an odd sound when I close it; that’s not unusual. I rent an apartment with an odd-sounding door and haven’t bothered to oil it up or whatever how you fix it. I turn my back on it when I hear an unmistakable sound of a piece of paper falling on the counter. My eyes land on an old index card.

Blowing the steam away from the tea, I pick it up and squint at the block letters handwritten between smudged lines. The first thought that comes to my head is, “Hell yeah! An old cake recipe. That’ll be fun.” Who doesn’t like baking a cake when they’re feeling down?

It gets unusual when I take a closer look at the ingredients listed. Six ounces of olive seed oil, two tablespoons chamomile leaves, one candle…

Unless you mix candle wax in your cakes, this is not a typical recipe.

I flip the old paper and read the large letters on the back of it:

A CEREMONY TO EASE THY BROKEN HEART

My earlier unsaid question has been answered with a yes. Some mysterious force had provided me with a quest, and damn it, I’m going to take it if it helps me get over the breakup.

Immediately, I sit down at my rinky-dink, messy table, and place the card down. Shifting through the pile of stuff on the table, I dig out a pen and paper. With the pen in my hand, I read the card and copy it on the fresher paper. Every time I read a line, I reread it in case I miss a word. I don’t have a legitimate reason for doing this other than to make the recipe more concrete in my head.

By the time I have the full instructions down, this is what it reads:

6 oz olive seed oil

2 tbsp fresh chamomile leaves

1 medium rosemary candle

7 drops strawberry essential oil

1 full cyclamen bulb, just ripened

1 small mortar and pestle

1 small plate

1 small jar

For the full effect of this ritual, the ingredients must be sourced from any of the following places: the City of Alexandria, the City of Savannah, and/or the City of Santa Monica. The potion is most effective when made under the new moon.

Light the candle and keep it burning on the plate. Using the mortar and pestle, grind the chamomile and cyclamen until they are as little as the pestle can make them. Add in the olive seed and strawberry oils and stir until it is a paste. Let it rest for ten minutes or until the candle has melted plenty of wax. Mix the melted wax in the paste and stir until all are melded together. Collect in the jar and give it an hour to rest. The first part of the ritual is complete.

Use it as a balm and rub it over your heart for the duration of the night. By dawn, the potion will be all used up and your heartbreak will be ten times as healed. Repeat if needed.

I know it’s a lot, but I’m so desperate to get this over with that I’d build a bridge to the moon if it meant I could feel better about Nathaniel. In reality, the directions are a lot simpler than I expect, so there’s one silver lining.

I pull up my laptop and search for one of the most important questions I have the moment I read the recipe: what’s cyclamen?

From what I gather, it’s a type of flower. When I ask myself, “Why out of all the typical flowers used in love-related potions would someone say cyclamen?” I find myself on a website detailing the Victorian language of flowers. It turns out cyclamen symbolizes “resignation” or “goodbye”. For a split second, before I tear up again, I smile at the image of Nathaniel giving me a gigantic cyclamen bouquet and running away as soon as they land in my open hands.

The next few things I search for are the cities. Santa Monica is in California, which I know already, but I still have to look up the other two. I even write down the states the cities are in so I don’t forget.

The first issue of this potential quest starts when I try to find the items and have them shipped to my apartment. It may be cheating having the ingredients coming my way instead of vice versa, but I always look for a way to keep my job at a grocery store before I find other options. With the lack of jobs in my state, I can’t afford to quit.

Unfortunately, it looks like I have to quit anyway. The locations of the ingredients are too specific to be found online. If I want them, I’ll have to get them myself. My boss at work is one of those “you can’t take a day off unless you’re dying” people, so I can’t come in and ask for two weeks off for some soul-searching.

But… there is such a condition as “Broken Heart Syndrome”. People can die from it. I know that from watching Scrubs. (It’s a much better medical drama than Grey’s Anatomy, in my opinion.) I can use this excuse for work and see what happens. Who knows, maybe it’ll work.

I hope to God it works.

My fingers tap on the keys as I go deeper into the research for the recipe. For the first time in a long time, a fire burns inside me, and I stoke it with every result I get. Raw energy comes out of nowhere, and before I know it I’m planning out a route from my town to the cities. I’m going all out with the details: where to find the cheapest gas along the way, the cheapest food, motels that don’t look roach or drug-infested, etc. It’s therapeutic, and I’m not stopping.

Until I see that it’s three in the morning and I have a shift starting in six hours. Swearing under my breath, I close my laptop and charge it nearby. I keep my paper between the flap and leave the old index card on the table.

Fighting back a yawn, I stretch and walk back to my bedroom. The raw energy I was feeling in the last two hours is fading away. I get into my bed and pull the blanket over me, intending to fall asleep in a moment. What happens instead is I keep staying awake, excited by the possibilities. It takes an hour for me to actually go to sleep.