Everyone experiences it at least once, heartache. Like a hand that has a tight grasp around your heart; gripping it tighter and tighter until it's hard to breathe. Holding back tears becomes painful and unbearable. Of course as a teenager, these feelings might be fleeting but does one really carry that pain with them into adulthood? Am I an exception to the rule? Maybe I need more time to let go of this grief and pain.

  But I'm the pathetic fucking mess of a man holding onto something that has an expiration date. Our relationship was only about sex and desperate companionship when our lives were falling apart.

  I knew of Elijah Haroldssen throughout high school, although we didn't officially meet until our third year. However, he caught my attention right away. Why? Because he's been eye-fucking me since our first year of high school. I became conscious of him immediately, I had many people approach me for my looks; men and women. I could tell he was the same as them, yet his gaze... was intense. Unlike the other men that had approached me; Elijah was built, tall, and had sharp features. The majority of the school was absolutely terrified of him, yet he was unphased.

  To be honest, I hated Elijah's fucking guts at first but I didn’t hate the attention he was giving me. His eyes followed me around every day from freshman year of high school to junior year. Yet no confession. At the time I thought: ‘if you’d just confess to me I could turn you down and end this needlessly staring.’ As time progressed it pissed me off more and more. I realized Elijah would never confess, I thought something was wrong with me. I began to reconsider if he had feelings for me or if he hated me. Was that all in my head? Why couldn’t I let it go? Was I imagining things?

  I eventually snapped and confronted Elijah about his staring; this led to an unbelievable aggressive sexual tension between the two of us. I never considered the idea of having romantic feelings towards him, it was always about sex.

  I wonder what it would have been like if I never confronted him about the whole thing. Would life have been better? Or worse? I’m still not sure.

  We continued the bitter cycle of our relationship after high school, we would meet up during college breaks as if it was agreed between the both of us without words. The summer break before our second year of college would be the last time I heard from him for two years. No explanation, but I didn’t expect him to give me one. I expected this type of ending to our relationship.

  This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

  I continued on with my life, dating a few men but mostly sticking to hookups. Elijah was stuck in the back of my mind like an endless loop of ‘what ifs,’ anger, and sadness. I forced myself to keep him out of my mind by throwing myself into writing novels. It was the only way to distance myself from reality.

  It was the first day of my last year of college, I thought I’d be excited but I woke up to a dark cloud hanging over me. I couldn’t shake the feeling something bad was going to happen. When I got to school, the college itself looked heavenly; people were bright and happy, excited for the future. I felt myself sigh, I wanted this year to end quickly. I could finally move out of the United States and move to Korea, I needed a plan to start over once my college years ended. After I graduated high school my parents moved to Korea with my little sister, my grandmother on my mom’s side became sick and my parents wanted to help the family take care of her.

  “ROAN!” a voice called out to me. I turned to see one of my friends, Yoni, running towards me. Like myself, Yoni was also a naturalized-citizen; his family had migrated to the United States when Yoni was only a few years old. We met through a group in high school for foreign exchange students in hopes to meet other kids from our homelands.

  “Dude!” Yoni exclaimed as he approached me and punched my arm.

  “What the fuck?” I pushed him back. “Why are you acting crazy?” I could tell Yoni was holding something back; his face was completely red, almost purple while he held his breath. “Spi-”

  “Yoni!” another voice called out. This time it was Cece, a friend Yoni and I met through a LGBTQ+ group in college. Cece had bouncy brown hair and dark green eyes, she grabbed Yoni by the back of his shirt and pulled him back.

  I glared at both of them, “What is going on?”

  “N-nothing!” Cece replied almost instantly; holding back Yoni and covering his mouth. “You have class right? Go to class! We will see you later, okay?” Cece pulled Yoni away before I could ask more questions.

  What in the hell is going on?

  That dark cloud hanging over me suddenly felt darker and heavier; my classes this semester would revolve around writing workshops and literary electives. The novel I had been working on was a sequel to a previous novel I wrote; a professor had pressured me to publish the book and it ended up doing well.

  I know what you’re thinking, it’s got to be Elijah. To be honest I thought the same; but this story has just begun. I knew my last year of college would be stressful, but what was to come was something I never expected to happen. I didn’t consider the possibility of my world turning upside down so abruptly.