It used to be that everything was so effortless.

It was all so simple. A causal touch here, holding hands there, and we’d go to my house to watch some movie on television after school. Weekends didn’t matter as long as we were having fun. I remember the times we’d spend the whole day in the upper branches of the strongest oak tree in the park, you holding me to make sure I wouldn’t fall.

At school it was always, “If they know, they know, and if they care, they care.” Then you’d grin at me saying jokingly, “I thought you knew better. Fuck ‘em all.”

And then something changed.

I knew it was bound to happen. They say that all good things must come to pass, and I’ve always wondered who was wise enough to know, not just speculate, but know that the sun must set on anything good.

Maybe I just hadn’t noticed anything before that day, but I remember when we were walking down the hall, walking to our next class together, and we turned a corner. It wasn’t unusual that at the locker bank there were kids standing there, the kids we’ve known since kindergarten. All the same, you dropped my hand and walked slower, mumbling for me to not wait up. I turned back to ask you why, but you were already in the middle of a conversation with one of the popular kids.

Then you came over to my house one day, as usual. I’d had already picked a movie for us to watch; you said you didn’t care that day. Half way through you just stopped watching, slipping your arm around my shoulders, sliding your hand down my pants, wrapping your fingers around me. It felt so good, but it just felt so wrong. We were on my family’s couch for god’s sakes, but when I tried to tell you, you didn’t care.

Weekends became just memories of you and me embracing in that oak tree as reality tilted and morphed into you going off with your new friends. It turned into me watching television in my bedroom; I couldn’t stand watching it in my living room anymore.

At school you only talked to me at our locker we shared and in classes your other friends weren’t in also. It was kinda weird, but I thought that it was just the end of school getting to you—it was getting to everyone else. After all, two months never seemed to take so long, and I couldn’t fathom that we’d ever break up since we’d been together for over a year.

It used to be that you’d tell me things, that you’d care about my feelings, my input. It used to be that we talked about things, and then one morning you took all your things out of our locker, and walked off without a word.

“So what’s this mean?” I asked dumbly.

You were half way down the corridor, but you still stopped, and without turning around answered, “It’s over.”

“Since when?”

“Months.” That was the last word you ever said to me, months, and it’s taken me months to figure out how true that statement was.

It used to be that were perfect for each other. It used to be “Fuck ‘em all.” Now it’s “Fuck you.”