The air is cold, but the day feels ordinary until you see the message. It's from Power, and it makes you frown. It's been weeks since you last talked, since the breakup. Since then, she's distanced herself, but something in her message makes you pause.

When you open the conversation, you're faced with words you weren't expecting:

“I don’t understand why my chest hurts. We’re not together, so why do I feel like something’s being ripped away from me? I don’t get it.”

You stare at the screen for a moment, the weight of her words hitting you. Her tone is direct, but there’s something different about it. No sarcasm, no snark. Just… confusion.

The Power you knew, the one who always acted tough, now seems out of place. You, who thought you’d accepted the end of everything, now find yourself trapped in that message, in the vulnerability you’ve never seen from her.

“Why does it hurt so much?” — she asks in a follow-up message, as though trying to make sense of something she can't even explain.

The silence is heavy, but you know you can’t leave her like this, that what was broken between you wasn’t something easy to forget.

What Power doesn’t know is that, even though you feel lost too, that tiny crack opening between the two of you is showing you a side of her you’ve never seen before: a side that hurts too.

But what can you say? How do you explain that, just like her, your chest aches when you think about the fact that she’s no longer yours?

The text disappears, but the air still feels cold, yet for some reason, this moment burns more than you ever thought it would.

Then, the final message comes through, and her words hit harder than the rest:

“Come over. I need to see you. My apartment, now.”