I was laying on the grass with my hair spread out all around me. A flower twirled in my one hand while Josh's beads were in the other. My eyes gently shut as I slipped into a gentle consciousness, slowly drifting further and further away. My essence was sinking into a sea of memories; warm memories. Moments and experiences that I could never bear to part with. Even if some were inherently painful, I treasured those select few. Dear incidents that I held close to my heart; they were preserved deep down inside of me. My breathing softened as I slipped entirely away. They were safe- deep, deep down.

Losing Peter was one of the most painful things that had ever happened to me. At the time I didn't know how much worse it could get; Peter's absence felt more agonizing than I ever could have imagined. I suppose I never realized how deeply in love I'd fallen with him. I know I wrote him a letter back in grade eleven, but so much as changed in the last year. Gradually, gradually I fell more and more with each passing day; without me even realizing what was happening. I never meant to fall so deeply, desperately in love; I didn't even know a love like that was possible. But unlike the sound of my mother's voice, I was too old now too forget him. I was too old to let him slip into my subconscious, though that would have been kinder. Anything would have been better than to suffer like this.

That's why I convinced myself that I wanted to forget. Or rather, I wished I'd never him; if I knew it would hurt this much, I wish I never laid eyes on him. Peter brought me so much joy… and pain; unfortunately, the latter outweighed the former right now. I read somewhere that the brain can repress truly excruciating memories over a short amount of time- why didn't that happen to me? This was torture; to go on without Peter in my life…. Yes, I didn't want those memories. I didn't want them at all, not if they made me cry myself to sleep every night. I know I'd forgotten before; there was years of my childhood blocked from my mind. Why? I have no clue; probably because I was too young to remember, Daddy wouldn't talk about it. He said it made me cry too much to remember, whatever he was referring to.

But…. as time passed, I slowly began to realize that the time Peter and I shared was here to stay. It was like an impress on me; I'd carry him everywhere with me. I gazed out the subway window into the tunnel's blackness. There's nowhere I could go that he wouldn't follow me; even across the world. Oh god, how I wish it was different. How I wish I never met him. How I wish he never read my poems on the school computer three years old. How I wish he never gave me his school ID or number on it. I wish…. I wish for so many things, my eyes lowered sadly, painfully. But most of all, I wish Peter and I never met; I wish I could exist in a world without him.

I was in kind of a daze when the train came to a stop; the door I was leaning against made me stumble when it suddenly opened. A crowd of people pushed past me, and I clamored out, not sure what stop this was. Not that it really mattered. I was so sad, so lost in my mind that the outside world was deafless to me. I didn't notice the people passing by, I didn't notice the trains, I didn't notice anything. It truly was like being in a fog; a deep, penetrating fog, stabbing me all over like sharp needles.

Oh god, my feet came to a halt as my eyes stared warily at the platform floor. How could I have been so stupid? How did I not see how far I was falling? Why couldn't I have just kept my feelings in check? My hand rose up to my now watery eyes. I can't believe how stupid I am; I'm such an idiot….. And I couldn't even be mad at myself because it was true. I did this; I did this to myself. I have no one to blame but myself. Peter's in love with Gen- he's been in love with her since grade eleven. And yet, despite that, I still…. I didn't mean to, but I still couldn't help loving him more every single day.

The train on the other side of the platform came roaring in, not that I cared. I just stood there motionless on the empty platform on my side, staring off at nothing like a complete loser. People got off the other train; people….. I don't care who they were; I didn't care about anything at the moment. I was just so sad and depressed at the fact that I couldn't forget Peter. No matter how much I wished it, we still live in a reality where we met…. where we met and I fell in love. My bottom lip shook uncontrollably. But no… I don't want that to be my reality. I don't want Peter to be there, inside me always. I know I say this a lot but it's true: I wish we'd never met. My body shifted in such a way that I was facing the other platform. I truly wish Peter and I had never met each other.

In that instant…. by some miracle…. I glanced up to see a stunned Peter staring back at me from the other platform. He was clearly surprised to find me down there. We just… ogled at each other aimlessly, timelessly. I don't know how long we stayed like that; we were both enamored with emotion that our faces didn't move a muscle. Everything was happening on the inside; way down beneath the surface. Eventually however, my lips parted a little as I remembered to breathe. My eyes began to widen as I started to understand, to slowly realize…. Oh my god, my heart started to race. Oh my god.

I do… tears rolled down my cheek while I continued to stare wide-eyed. I know… I know why I love him so much. Just one look, like every day back in high school, I'm reminded again and again. I also realize why Peter seems so different from other boys. I love Peter simply because he is easy to love, he is easy to look at. More heavy tears. Sure, he's nice but I think it has something to do with his eyes… his deep, endless eyes. They weren't looking at me now; they never looked at anything. Peter's eyes did much more than "look"; they were like hooks to the soul, pulling you deeper and deeper into his being, his essence. Peter was a part of me, but I slowly came to comprehend that I was a piece of him now too. His eyes soaked me up like a sponge, just like they did every day for the past three years. Yes, he was easy to love… so remarkably easy to love, to adore.

Peter flinched, coming to when my feet slid back the tiniest. "Aerity!" His voice! "H-hey, Aerity! Aerity, wait!" His voice….. "I want to talk to you!" I didn't know it at the time. I didn't know that that would be the last time I heard him in six years; that this was the last time we'd see each other for so, so long. I didn't know that I'd be moving across the world in a few months, and I didn't know how close Josh and I would become in Peter's absence. Maybe if I did, I wouldn't have immediately run away from him. I wouldn't have spun around, and madly dashed down the platform and up the staircase without looking back. I would have looked back… oh god, how I wanted to see those endless, hooking eyes of his.

It was on that day that I realized how wrong I'd been. No… after I saw him, after I was reminded how much I loved him, I couldn't imagine a world where we didn't meet. I now saw that I needed Peter, even if merely as a memory. He was one of the best things that ever happened to me, and no amount of wishing or memory-erasing would change that. Peter was here to stay and that was a good thing; it had to be a good thing, since it couldn't be any other way. The image of Peter and I appeared; we were much older then, probably in our mid to late twenties. We were sitting on a grassy hill with the sea in the near distance. Yet despite that, I was convinced that I wasn't for Peter; it just wasn't meant to be. He'd stay here and live his life, and I'd have to move on with mine. This pain couldn't last forever; that would be unbearable. We smiled at each other; we were smiling.

I guess I'll never tell Peter any of this; we exist now, only as memories to each other. But… My eighteen-year-old self cried silently, curled up on my bed with the covers all pushed away. I won't be able to stop loving Peter. Not tomorrow, or the day after, or thereafter….. Regardless if he's actually here with me or not, I will still be in love with Peter in the most hopeful, most hopeless way. Thinking of only Peter, I cried myself to sleep that night.