*beware* cursing all over the fucking chapter.

"Alright. Alright." I sighed. "How are you feeling?"

"How do you think I'm feeling?" Evelyn boasted, "he fucking broke up with me. I didn't see that coming."

I had just woke up. I was still in bed, but I called her anyway. On the phone. I never heard her this serious before. It was kind of scary. "Can you tell me exactly what happened?"

"I told you exactly what happened," her voice cracked, "he broke up with me."

I honestly did not know how to feel. I guess I was happy that the ghost of this Sean fellow wasn't haunting our relationship anymore, but at the same time, I hated to see her like that.

She possibly hadn't even slept. She possibly had been up all night crying. And that made me want to cry myself.

Never had I ever experienced such feelings.

"Yeah, that I understood," I said slowly, "but can you tell me what he said to you? How he broke up with you?"

She started laughing wryly in despair. "Oh, that's just the best part of it."

"Alright," I said, slowly once again, "try to focus. Calm down and tell me."

I heard her taking a deep distorted breath. "You see, you don't know Sean. You never even heard him before, right? Well, he's always been the perfect type of boy. He always acted like Prince Charming..." she chuckled, "I know right? Well, he never ever showed one defect. Always so smart, so intelligent and cultured. Always so perfect that he looked unreal. Until lately... lately he started to show a different side. He started, wearing dark... acting dark. I took a glance at his phone, and his wallpaper was a knife. That seemed rather unlikely... but I thought... you know... he's 16... maybe he's just changing character... that's normal... but I never thought..." her voice cracked again, as she cried again.

I felt really bad. Almost as if I had done that to her. I wanted to be there to hug her, or just put a hand on her shoulders... let her know that she wasn't alone. But I couldn't do that from 404 miles away. All I had was my voice, and I had never been good at talking to other people.

"Alright," I mumbled, "just... yeah... just cry it out. You'll feel better... I guess..."

"He said something so stupid..." she snorted, "I don't want to believe it."

"What?" I asked, "what did he say?"

"With his usual... fucking stupid... philosophical way..." she scolded, "he started talking in metaphors... he said that he had a little statue... a figurine... on his shelf... and it was so beautiful and perfect, he wanted to have it there forever... but then... while he was redecorating, it fell... and it broke. And as he picked it up, and he looked at it. He felt sorry for such perfection to just break so easily. He tried to piece it back together... and he did. He put the pieces back together and put the statue back on the shelf. But when he looked at it now... he realized it just wasn't as beautiful as before. All the perfection got lost... and so did his love for it."

I leaned back on the bed and rested my head on the pillow, as she kept crying in my ears. I waited a few moments before talking. "Let me tell you what I think."

"Okay..." she murmured.

I sighed. "I think he's a dumbass... and a coward. He's a coward because he wasn't able to tell you what he felt directly. He had to go through that metaphor. And he's a dumbass because he thinks that his metaphor justifies what he did. And, most importantly, he thinks that he's a normal person for thinking like that. Well, let me tell you something... how long have you been with this guy?"

"About eight months..." she said.

"Okay." I raised my brows. "So, after eight months he realized one important thing. He realized he couldn't handle human beings... he couldn't handle being with someone with feelings. He realized he couldn't handle the imperfections we're made of. He wanted something plastic... something fictional... like his character with you. I am pretty certain that the way he acted with you was just a character he was playing... to make you like a sorry excuse of a man like him... and when he realized that you, on the other hand, weren't playing a character like him... but you were being your real self... he just couldn't handle it. When the statue fell, it didn't break. Because it was never perfect in the first place. When it fell, it just dawned on him that the statue was already broken."

Another moment passed by without anyone saying a word. In those moments, things had to take time to be digested, for they were shoved down throats despite the unwillingness of being taken.

"You're probably right," she mumbled at one point, her voice now sounded dry as a funeral drum.

"And how does that make you feel?" I asked.

She sighed. "I think it's gonna be quite the time before I feel better."

"It sure is..." I sighed too, "that's why you have to be strong now... that's the thing about heartbreaks. Like that damn statue, the heart can't just be fixed by piecing it back together, maybe putting a bandaid on it. You have to keep it like that. Broken. And you have to suffer through the pain, knowing it's never going to be mint again. But, when the time is right, it will stop aching despite being broken."

"I hope that time comes soon..." she said.

"I hope so too."

"Thank you."

"You don't have to thank me."

"No, I do. I'm glad I met you. If I hadn't, I'd still be crying right now."

"Well, I'm glad to hear that."

"You are an Avsam friend."

"And you are too, Avsam. Don't let that asshole put you down."

All of a sudden, I noticed that my mother was getting out of her room, which is next to mine.

"Sorrygottagobye," I quickly said as I abruptly hung up on Evelyn.

Of course, my mother immediately came into my room. "Oh, you're up already. Why didn't you come down for breakfast yet?"

"I woke up just now," I lied, "I was about to come down."

"Who was it on the phone?" she asked, again.

"Andrew." I said without thinking.

"And what did he want at this time in the morning?" she wondered.

"Asked me if I wanted to go out with him this afternoon," I lied.

"So you're going?" she asked.

"No," I said, "I don't feel like it."

"Yeah, of course," she said, "keep acting like that and you'll lose your two friends you still have."

"I see why you're telling me that, mom." I got up and approached the door, walking past her, trying to keep my rage inside of me. "I guess you used to act like me too, in your youth, right? That's why you don't have any friends now."

After realizing that she didn't have any comeback to that, I swept downstairs, feeling both satisfied and guilty for saying that.

As I sat down for breakfast, I sent Evelyn my apologies. "Sorry for hanging up. Mother invaded room. Love you."

My father was in the kitchen, minding his business, acting like I wasn't there. He only tilted his head when my phone rang for a text.

"No worries, love you too Avsam."

I read back the text I wrote. I typed it without thinking about it too much, and only now did I realize that I told her that I 'loved her'.

And, most importantly, she said it back.

The thing is, I never said 'love you' to anybody before. Not my mother, not my father, and certainly not any friends.

And, incidentally, nobody ever said it to me.

It was all so new, I couldn't help but smile in front of my phone.

That's when my father decided to notice me, to strike me with his usual stupid line to put me down. But I barely listened to him.

That moment, I felt like nothing could possibly put me down.

I wish it could have really been like that, but it really wasn't.

***

A little anxiety in the end is always good. But this was the greatest long-distance call yet, wasn't it? Did you enjoy this chapter? Let me know with a VOTE and a COMMENT!

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