Part of me dies inside when I hear his name. Part of me misses him, and of course, part of me wants to rip his face off for breaking my heart. Like any normal teenager would, my first reaction was to cry and, like the foolish naive girl I am, try and get him back. The crying part was easy, the getting him back part was a lost cause, but the third part was particularly challenging. Coming to realization. To put a time and place on it, I guess it was when I over heard him ask out another girl and confess his feelings for her less than a day after he told me he had none left for me. Thanks for the virtual b**** slap of reality, god, the message in that was fairly straightforward. But what really set my thought process into motion was when my knees buckled beneath me at the horrifying sound of these secrets that I was not meant to hear, when by best friend was there to catch me. To hold me. To literally dry my tears and tell me that I would be okay in the end. When my best guy friend was there to say he loved me, even if some shallow jerk didn't anymore. Sure, call this next statement cliché, but it hit me, in those moments, that I wasn't alone.

The sudden break up may have left single in a shockingly abrupt time period, but what I associated being single with was being lonely, when honestly I couldn't be more incorrect in that thought process than I have been in anything else. I got the idea into my brain that the separation would mean that I was no longer loved, as I sat there with mascara running down my cheeks, in a crumpled heap in a corner of a bathroom I convinced myself that I was right in thinking that. Until my best friend came to me, and let me rest my head on her shoulders and gently held my hand. That's when the realization hit me like a freight train head on. Love is not just a feeling felt between couples. There are so many different forms of love. Family. Friendship. Couples. Anyone who acts in a kind manor with good intentions will be rewarded with friendship, respect, and love. I was dumped, for the first time in my life, from my first real relationship, and I never felt so lost. I came to know, however, that I was not lost, and was not alone. The ones who loved me most were there to pick me up and dust me off and lead me back to sanity.

Though I lost a great deal of ability to trust others (particularly in men) in this ordeal, I learned so much. That love will parade you through life in many different forms. And of course I discovered the most complex relationships may teeter on the thin line of love and hate, but the deciding factor of which category your emotions for one another may fall into, is trust. That when you bestow trust in someone, and they shatter that trust you present them perhaps oh, too hastily, you cannot love them, or trust them. It leads down only one road, the road of anger, disapproval and even hatred. But those whom are granted your trust and recognize it as a blessing will repay you by giving you their trust and support in return, which leads you bestow upon the other, a higher level of approval and honor. Love.

That is the day I knew love was real. Not because a boy kissed me and made my heart skip a beat, but because my true friends proved to me that I could trust them, that they would always be there for me, that they loved me and I loved them. A door closed and so many more opened. I'll find love one day, I know it. Part of me wishes for a real relationship, but for now I am content with the love and support I receive every day from my family and friends. I'm discovering. I'm realizing. I'm finally healing.