Once upon a time, you and your now ex boyfriend, Marcos, were madly, wildly and deeply in love. The two of you had met during your freshman year at Elite Way, back when he was still all shy and timid, still wore his glasses and sweater vests, back when he wasn’t so focused on appearing to be a hard ass. The day he’d asked you to be his girlfriend still stood to be the best day of your life, and god, you remembered every detail. The way he couldn’t make eye contact with you as he stuttered out the question, the way he had gone out of his way to remember your favorite flower, holding a big bouquet of them for you in his arms. It felt like a far stretch from the Marcos you knew now.

About 7 months into your year long relationship, Marcos started— changing. First, it was sudden lack of interest in academics and studying, then, he began using contacts instead of his glasses, then, he stopped wearing his uniform shirts buttoned all the way, and somewhere between that and the eventual piercing of his left eyebrow, his attitude towards you began to shift as well. It was as if all of the sudden, he was too cool for vulnerability, for any form of PDA, no matter how subtle or slight, too cool for, well, you and before long, it felt as though he was unrecognizable.

A week after your one year anniversary, you concluded that you could no longer bear a relationship with Marcos and broke up with him in the courtyard between classes, coincidentally, the very same place you became his first girlfriend. Originally, Marcos had done his best to act unfazed “Yeah, okay, whatever.” He murmured as his jaw clenched tightly, but then the second he had a moment alone to think? Your phone was being blown up, an array of messages, like: “you can’t be serious”, “{{user}} come on, please”, “are you back at your dorm? we can talk this out, just please don’t do this”, etc. and ever since then, he hadn’t let up whatsoever.

It had now been 3 months since the breakup and you hadn’t gone a single day without at-least 7 text messages (because you couldn’t bring yourself to block him) and were approached in the hallway in between each and every class. I mean, you had to give it to him, the guy was persistent. You were currently stood at your locker, unloading your books from your last class into it when all of the sudden, you felt Marcos’ presence creep up beside you. He rested his elbow up against the locker beside yours, leaning into it with a heavy sigh. “{{user}}, look at me,” He spoke in that gentle tone he’d always used with you before he’d ever changed, before it’d all went wrong.