It's late, and Jason isn't home yet. I don't know if it's a habit or it's just once in a lifetime. But I can't keep myself from worrying. I hear some noise, it must be him. I rush to the door, not caring that I'll look like a creep, but I need to see him, to make sure he's fine.

"Emily? Why are you still up?" He's drunk, his eyes are red and he can barely stand on his feet, I wonder how he drove here.

"Uh, I...I was waiting for you"

"For me? Why?" he says while coming closer.

"Oh, I was just worried about you"

"Really?" He's much closer now "I didn't know you care about me" dangerously close, I can feel his breathe, I almost can taste what he's been drinking.

"Well I-I was just afraid"

"Afraid? From what?" he's concerned.

"Nothing" he's intensely looking at me, analyzing me "I should go to sleep," I say while breaking the eye contact, fighting the urge of not staying here looking at him the whole night, at his beautiful eyes.

"You're afraid of me" he exclaims. I'm baffled because It's true. I'm afraid of him, not of him hurting me, at least physically. But I'm afraid of what he makes me feel, afraid of him hurting me emotionally. It's dumb to think this way about someone that I just met.

"What are you-"

"Despite what you may think, I do care about you" My body's confused. Torn between believing him and melting at his confession or showing him that him caring about me means nothing to me.

My brain seems to settle on the most neutral and crude responses possible "Good night Jason!" He looks at me vexed.

"You really got a brilliant communication skills" I roll my eyes at him, he's right though.

"You must sleep, You're drunk," I say while turning around to my room.

"Because of you" I freeze, It's almost a whisper, almost. But I've heard him and I'll act like I didn't.

------

I'm wide awake, I can't sleep. Not after what just happened; the weird 'confrontation' I had with Jason. I feel guilty, he's been drinking because of me.

But he must know that he shouldn't expect anything from me. That I'm not ready right now, and I'm not sure when I will be.

Because based on real life stories and what I've been through, most of the relationships end with a breakup or a heartbreak. And for me 'The feeling of breakup' was like going through death helplessly. I still vividly remember how bad it hurts. It hurts so much that I used to spend the whole day forcing myself to sleep, I couldn't bear being awake thinking about it.

I had to spend the day smiling and trying to sound ok when I wasn't at all. I spent a long time pretending I was doing fine until I became good at it, it became a habit. No one had ever realized that everything was wrong. I wanted them to know my suffering, I really did. But my need to look strong and unbreakable overcame me, so I kept it all inside. I knew that everything will be ok again and Life goes on. But knowing it back then didn't bring any comfort.

I kept wondering how could he easily live without me when not a second goes by without me missing him, craving him. How could he devalue all those good times and memories? I felt weak because he was my only weakness.

My heart still hurts, the remnants of that pain still exist. I couldn't heal, all I could've done back then is to build walls around my heart, circle it with fences, keep it out of touch. And for a long time it worked, I learned to live with a heartbreak and promised myself that I won't let me or my heart go through another one.