What does it really mean to let go? Our Letting Go series highlights these compelling and complicated stories. When I was 13, I made a checklist of traits I required of my future husband. I was a shallow year-old. Successful whatever that meant as a teen? Treats me like a queen, even in my least queenly moments such as that one time I had too much tequila and yelled at him in front of all my friends to buy me chicken nuggets?
Buys me chicken nuggets, no questions asked? Check, check, check. And yet. Leo and I found each other unexpectedly, both freshly single from previous relationships. It felt right in a way no other romantic relationship had before in my life. With my previous boyfriends, there was always an imbalance between who loved and who was loved. With Leo, it felt equal. We loved each other the exact sameβwhich would be a lot, and passionately.
I remember sitting in the passenger seat of his small burnt-orange Honda Fit one particularly warm L. It seemed she was going on strings of unsuccessful dates with guys who would either ghost her or treat her poorly. Leo was more reserved, careful, and stoic, at least at first he was half-British, after all βbut throughout our relationship, this flash of a smile, always accompanied by a crinkling of his blue eyes, would remind me that I was loved by him. I had never loved or been loved in this way before, the kind of love that sees all of your broken, unsightly parts and jagged edges and embraces you anyway, even if it tears itself a bit in the process.
It felt like a grown-up type of loveβthe type of love that sustains the one major romance you have for the rest of your life. For almost three years, I was in a blissful cloud. We were in a blissful cloud. Everything happening around us felt hazy, tinged in Millennial Pink, and warm. Nothing could really go wrong, because we had each other.
Never mind the nagging little voice in my head reminding me the reason I broke up with my previous boyfriend was to pursue my dream of moving to New York and learn how to be alone. Never mind that. When that voice crept up, I quashed it immediately.
