Athena
After a few months in college, my boyfriend broke up with me.
I found it funny how I cried over a guy when I tried so hard to put up a strong, independent woman façade every damn time. It was tiring since I wasn't as strong and independent as I thought I was.
I dropped by our room as soon as I got back from home.
I went a day ahead of him, at least from what I know from our common friends.
It was weird going into the room where it happened. Where everything happened.
I stared at it as I stood around the doorway, my hands tracing the edges of the doorframe. I sighed and let my tired eyes wander further into the smaller details of the room.
It was a little more spacious than an average university dorm room because of the disability accommodations. It had enough space for the both of us, but I felt kinda bad since it my stuff took up the most space.
It had two of our beds side by side each other, although they hadn't been arranged this way the first time we came. They had been pushed against opposite sides of the room then, but I insisted we push them right beside each other after the first week because I was homesick.
He was my only connection to home that time. Of course I would like him close by.
I smiled sadly once all those memories of me pushing our beds side by side infiltrated my mind, resurfacing that instance when Owen seriously bought popcorn and soda just to watch me fix our room layout that time.
"Sorry I can't help. I'm here for moral support though." Owen once said with a cheeky smile as his mouth was full of popcorn.
I shook my head and then proceeded to remove some of the room decor I put up on my side of the room.
My side was more like a Pinterest board and his was like something from a house catalogue.
I walked slowly, eyeing the side of the wall where I put up high school memorabilia, posters and postcards, and yes, the ever so Gen Z polaroids.
I stood in front of them now, and I felt my hands hesitate to reach out and remove them from the wall. I stared at them, remembering the importance they once had.
Owen liked photos. He used to have a wall full of them back at his room in junior year. Well, he did, before he let me rip them out and unveil what was printed on the other side.
I shuddered at the memory of those.
It was haunting, and I never want to see anyone, especially him, get hurt ever again. Even now.
Going back, I slowly took off the posters and post cards I had. They didn't have that much significance anyway, aside from being there for aesthetic purposes.
I had trouble removing the polaroids, though.
They were there, staring at me like a ghost of my past.
If I had so many polaroids back in my own room at home, they were fewer here, but they hold greater meaning.
One was of me, Aunt Lydia, and our dog, Maxie.
God, I miss them so much now. I put up a finger to trace my aunt's features and also, my dog's. Owen loved my dog. I had a hunch Maxie loved him more than she loves me.
I sighed, and slowly took it off the wall, carefully removing the tape that clung to the back.
Next was of me and my friends.
I didn't know why of all the photos I had to put up here, it was one of the few photos I took during the time I got hurt.
I was still in a halo that time, but I seemed to be having fun, given that I was chugging down an entire bottle of imported wine in Tim's house as Tim, Viv, and Calix all looked at me in horror.
I let out a small laugh, looking over their horrified expressions in fear that I would break another bone or hurt myself again. Damn, I love them so much.
It took me quite some time to put it and the others down but what I can't seem to remove were the photos of just Owen and I. That, I stared at longer than the others.
One had just Owen, asleep in my car as he hugged Maxie with her head out the window.
I shook my head and smiled, remembering the time I took this.
"Owen, wake up." I told him as I shook him with a free hand.
I had been driving.
From the passenger seat, he shifted a little, hugging Maxie tighter as the dog stared out into the busy streets of town.
"No." Owen answered, shifting more as he now faced front and had his eyes closed, his head laying gingerly on Maxie's back. His wavy, dark hair spilled down her white coat and the dog couldn't be more happy with the guy.
I playfully punched his arm with a hand and he subtly opened an eye only to glare at me.
"Owen! Keep an eye on the dog, would you? I'm driving." I said laughingly.
"And I'm sleeping."
He grunted and turned in his sleep, towards me this time.
I felt my heart do little cartwheels. His hair had been all over his eyes again, and I took the chance to sweep them upwards a little.
"If Maxie's head gets cut off, you're banned from entering my house ever again." I threatened him.
He shrugged.
"I don't care. I can't get up to your room anyway."
"Owen!"
I set aside that memory and removed the photo.
The next photo was of the both of us, during senior prom.
I took it down slowly, and in my hands, I stared at it as I brushed my fingers across the photo we took in the photo booth.
I had sat on his lap in that photo with my arms wrapped around his waist, and Owen, he just looked so shocked, with his eyes wide open and his expression so confused but at the same time, amused.
"Someone's enthusiastic today." he said, after we left the booth, with a lopsided grin on his face.
I smiled back at him, twirling in my sparkling emerald green dress, laughing.
"Is it bad?" I asked.
His smile grew wider as he pulled me lower until our foreheads were nearly touching.
"No. Not at all." he said, before leaning in for a kiss.
I shoved that photo inside my pocket along with the others and then proceeded to look over the last photo stuck on my side of the wall.
It was of Owen and I, huddled close together in his bed back at home, with his arms wrapped around me as he slept. His head had been laying on my shoulder and we had been so close to each other, I almost felt his body heat escape from the photo.
I pondered over it a little and looked.
This had been during the day of what must've been our junior prom. We didn't go, by the way. Owen had been sick.
"I'm so sorry I ruined prom night for you." he breathed out with his eyes closed as he hugged me once I crept up by his bed that late afternoon.
"It's okay. Take care of yourself first, alright? You easily get sick." I said as I combed my fingers through his hair, untangling them.
He grunted.
"I'm sorry." he muttered through hot breaths.
His fever was still high. I suspect it had been from being over-fatigued from school.
I shook my head and wrapped my arms around him gently, patting his back softly with a hand.
"Shh, your fever won't go down if you keep talking." I told him, as I started to close my eyes too.
I was getting a bit sleepy.
"I still feel terrible, anyway." I heard him say.
I sighed.
"Not going to prom won't make me like you any less. It's fine." I reassured him.
With that, he painfully opened one of his eyes and looked at me worriedly.
"Are you sure?" he asked.
With a smile and a cup of his face, I answered.
"Yes, I am."
I finished putting down the photos and other memorabilia from my side of the wall and turned around.
I was done with this part of my life and I felt somewhat prepared for whatever's gonna happen to me.
I was getting the hang of being single.
I was starting to get used to not being so mopey about not having someone around to do so many things with.
I can enjoy things by myself, just not to the extent which I expected to.
I didn't want to be put down by some break up and I didn't want to be so worked up about a single guy who did what he thought was best for us.
This will buy us time to think things through; our separate times alone, I mean.
For now, I am my own priority.
I was moving over to Fitz's room for the meantime, hence, the stuffing of random crap into my bag.
Things would just be so awkward between Owen and I if I stay there.
To be honest, I don't think I'm moving somewhere else permanently since I had been listed with Owen for the rest of the year, but now, I think bunking in with Fitz for a couple weeks would give both Owen and I some space.
I'll come back when things aren't as hostile and awkward between us.
Later that day, someone knocked on the door.
Owen's door.
It felt wrong to still call it our door since I was temporarily going to bunk with someone else.
I turned hesitantly and I felt a sense of relief rush through me as it wasn't the only person I was not quite ready to talk to just yet.
"Hey." he said.
I smiled.
"Fitz."
His curly hair had been cut a bit shorter now and his glasses are now wire-rimmed, in place of his old thick ones. He was leaning against the door, his eyes wandering first, the room, until they landed on me.
"You good?" he asked, motioning my bag.
I nodded.
"Yeah. I think I am." I answered.
I was not quite sure I was ready to leave. I wasn't sure if I even want to.
"Are you sure you want to do this?" Fitz asked, as he slowly walked towards me, ready to pick up my full travel bag.
"Maybe. Maybe not. But I think I need to, though." I said.
He nodded.
"Okay. You ready?"
I sighed.
"As I'll ever be." I said blankly, as we walked out the door, my gaze still lingering on what remained now of Owen's room.
By the time Fitz was a bit ahead of me and I was still stuck outside, I was hesitant to leave.
I turned back.
I quickly dropped the pillows I had been holding and went back inside, feeling a little bit more emotional than I had previously thought.
Is this really necessary?
Once I picked myself up a bit, I decided to leave Owen a note.
He doesn't know I'm moving out of the room for a while. It would be better not to leave him in the dark, anyway. Leaving a note was the least I can do.
I scribbled down what I failed to tell him that day we bumped into each other outside Delta's and signed my initials on it.
He'll know it had been from me, eventually.
After writing down what must be written on one of Owen's blank sheets of paper, I stuck it on the mirror inside the bathroom and left in a hurry.
Fitz is waiting for me.
I really was moving out.