Anything you recognise is the property of Jane Austen, Hank Green and Bernie Su. The title, Love Ire and Song, is taken from Frank Turner's album of the same name. All lyrics have been credited. No infringement intended.
I tried my best to embrace the darkness in which I swim - Ben Howard, 'Keep Your Head Up'
Forty seven days, nineteen hours, seven minutes exactly.
Some days, he struggles to believe he even did it. It just doesn't make sense. He's calm and measured and controlled and definitely not impulsive. And she was wild and uncontainable and impossible and everything that needed more than he could offer her.
Is. Not was at all.
He remembers now some nonsense Fitz had spouted to Gigi. Something about breaking up with someone being similar to grieving for someone because suddenly that person can't exist for you anymore. He remembers biting back a sigh at that piece of psychobabble.
And now he wishes more than anything that he was still that cynical. He's not.
She opened his eyes to how world weary he was. He can't shut out those truths she forced upon him. All he can do is deal with them. Without her. Without even the possibility of her.
Some days, he struggles to find the motivation to bother. He got on fine before her, after all. He had Gigi and Fitz and Bing. He had Aunt Catherine. He had Caroline, and Reynolds and the members of the board, and the guys at his biking club and his old college friends. They didn't care that he was sometimes a little more brusque than necessary; if anything they understood why.
So he'll sink back into familiarity again. He'll watch from the edge of the room, he'll listen and not contribute, he'll argue and antagonise. And then her voice will sound from the depths of his mind and he'll close his eyes briefly and when he opens them, he'll see himself as she sees him and feel sickeningly disappointed that he's failing at something.
Some days are less of a struggle. Conversation comes a little easier. Smiling doesn't feel so forced. He meets with Gigi and Fitz, he speaks to Bing, he helps ambitious go-getters overflowing with optimism get started in the industry; he almost feels good about himself. He imagines where he'd be if only he'd been like this at the Gibson wedding. He stops those daydreams pretty quickly. What's the point in what ifs?
Some days, he struggles to press play on those clips she uploads. Because some days he knows, he just knows, that she's never going to see the changes he's made for her.
But he just can't resign himself to that impenetrable certainty yet.
Keep your head up, keep your heart strong.
Keep your mind set in your ways.
Keep your heart strong - Ben Howard, 'Keep Your Head Up'