That’s how my brain felt. Like I was shoving odd puzzle pieces together.

That you love him so much the idea of losing him hurts just as immediately and fully as if you’d already lost him?

I had so much going on in my heart, and it didn’t often go together or make sense or even stay the same from moment to moment. How did I speak from a heart that didn’t undersand itself?

I didn’t care. I didn’t care about anything anymore. What did it matter? What did anything matter now? I was alone. I had no home, no family, nowhere that I belonged. In that moment, I finally and truly understood what it meant to have nothing to lose.

I didn’t say anything at all, because somehow saying nothing seemed more humane than giving him all these reassurances.

I’d called Marin a nuisance, had made her feel unwelcome and unwanted, the same way I was feeling now. Not being wanted was the loneliest feeling in the world, it seemed, and if I could have had one more moment with Marin, I would have been sure to tell her I didn’t mean it. She wasn’t a pest. I loved her. She was wanted. More than she could ever know.

There was prom and finals and graduation. There were summer parties. Movies. Mini golf and dates and college orientations. There as life, moving on, and I missed it. Not because I couldn’t go physically, but because I couldn’t go emotionally. There were whole days when I couldn’t leave my bed, not because of the bruises and scars, but because getting up and facing the world for another day felt too frightening, and too pointless.

But it was too much. All of it was too much. I didn’t know what I was feeling, but I knew I needed some time alone, some space to think about everything.

It’s okay for someone to let you win sometimes, you know,′ he said, getting all serious. ‘We don’t always have to be the losers, Valerie. They may want to make us feel that way, but we’re not. Sometimes we get to win, too.

Welcome to the Midwest, Mom used to say. Where the weather keeps you guessing and you’re almost always sure to hate it.