Content warning: mentions of sex-
ual assault.
Writer’s note: This is not about
one person in particular, but a com-
pilation of memories from different
people I have met. I wrote this piece
to both share my experiences and
thoughts on dating and relationships
as well as to use this piece to finally let
go and free myself of the heavy memo-
ries I have hidden so deep inside of me
for so long.
~~~
My bed feels a little emptier now
that you left. The outline of your
body is still pressed into the crum-
pled, untucked sheets. The smell of
your neck and my favorite cologne
is left behind and is only noticeable
when I roll over onto your side and
press my nose against your pillow,
which I try to avoid as to not mess up
the remnants of your outline.
I ask if I’ll see you tomorrow, but
you don’t respond. I ask what you
have planned for the rest of the day.
You respond with nothing more
than an “I’m pretty busy today.”
It’s as if you’re just brushing me off,
enough that I understand and don’t
ask you to grab lunch later. As you
leave, you peek outside to make sure
my roommate isn’t there, so you can
leave without a trace to ensure that
the only people who knew about us
were you and me.
~~~
My fingers tingle as the tips of
them reach your warm skin. With-
out much thought, I draw little
hearts on your back and rub my
thumb delicately against your soft
lips while your eyes flutter closed.
We lay, as vulnerable and open as we
possibly can, on a twin bed too small
for either of us, let alone us both.
You hold the most fragile part of me
broken from years of heartbreak and
bruises as you put your arm around
me, and yet you have no idea. No idea
of all the pain that my arms have felt
from being pinned down. No idea
of the residual pain from the half-
closed seal left on my mouth from all
the hands that pressed against my
lips to muffle anything that came
out. You have no idea that you are
the first to see me and hold me after
what happened. And I don’t know if
you ever will.
~~~
You looked at me. You really
looked at me. Past the smeared mas-
cara deep into my eyes, which you
always loved the dark color of since
they were much darker than yours,
and past the old dried contacts and
the redness they have caused found
underneath all those black layers
of grief and worry, lies something
open and bright. A space that no one
has tainted yet, untouched by your
hands or the hurt they will inevi-
tably cause. And you smile at me. A
smile at first filled with excitement
and admiration. A smile of comfort
and tenderness and purity. A smile
that quickly turns into arrogance
and control as you reach into that
open space of hope and innocence
and inject it with your dark essence.
Yet I hold them open. I don’t shut
them closed.
I leave them open, for you.
~~~
You asked me if I have ever
dreamt of you. “Once,” I said. I lied
because I didn’t have the heart to tell
you what it was about. Even though
you deserved to hear every painful
detail of the effect you have left on
me, how could I have explained to
you as you towered above me that
the dream was a nightmare? And a
recurring one for that matter. How
I’d wake up in a panic at the thought
of you still being a daily part of my
life, panting, out of breath, quickly
searching for the lights so I can
turn to my side and make sure you
weren’t actually there. How would
you react? Would you get mad at me,
or just be disappointed at the real-
ization of what my dream said about
you as a human being?
~~~
Innocence. It’s what I first thought
when I met you. It was what I liked
about you. Curly hair, curlier than
mine. Sweaters and slacks and nerdy
tennis shoes. A sweet smile and a
comforting glance. Round eyes, big-
ger than mine. You’d listen to me talk
for hours straight with nothing on
your face but a look of interest mixed
with nervousness from us being
alone. A smile I read as affection-
ate. A touch flooded with romantic
hesitation and awkwardness. I don’t
know what happened. Why you sud-
denly became like everyone else,
and then ultimately worse like your
friends? Was it my fault? Am I the one
who drained you of your innocence,
or was it something bigger than me?
~~~
My roommates weren’t home, all
four of them. It was just you and me,
nowhere to go. You knew that. You
knew what that meant. But I ask you,
do you know what you left me with?
When you left hours after seeing the
tears form in my eyes, pretending
you never saw them. After hearing
my voice crack and my body shiver
the entire time you were over. Do
you know what happened after? The
second, I shut the door and locked
every lock in case you just decided
to turn back? How I sobbed in the
shower while I scrubbed my skin
red? How I couldn’t wear my favor-
ite shirt for over a month? How I
avoided anyone new for over half a
year in fear they would be like you?
How I would walk every day on
campus desperately searching for
you in hopes that my eyes wouldn’t
land on that black jacket of yours?
How I still almost cry when some-
one else reminds me of you and that
day? How I can’t go even a couple of
days without being reminded of you?
Does what happened ever slip
into your mind? Do you convince
yourself nothing happened and that
I just stopped responding? Do you
point me out to your friends when
you see me walking? Or do you pre-
tend I don’t exist the way I have tried
so hard to do with you?
~~~
Is this love? Is this what finding
love is? Meeting all these people
who will all end in the same man-
ner. Are these the mushy feelings
you describe as the greatest feel-
ing in the world? Must we destroy
ourselves until there is nothing left
but an outer shell and a puddle of
who we once were, all in search to
find someone who we created an
image of in our heads? Something
we painted them with as sweet and
romantic and understanding: the
perfect person to share your life
with. We idolize them and at the
end of the day, they are just people.
They scar and they bruise, and you
leave, before they get a chance to.
They are just another memory that
you try to escape from while sitting
a couple of rows behind them in
class. And if this is love, do I really
want it?
Michigan in Color
Wednesday, February 22, 2023 — 7
is this love?
ROSHNI MOHAN
MiC Assistant Editor
Design by Roshni Mohan
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
A box of galentine thoughts
I discovered my womanhood
through Amy Dunne’s “cool girl”
monologue from the movie “Gone
Girl” (arguably pretty late in life).
The “cool girl” monologue didn’t
tell me I was a woman as such but
instead taught me what it means
to be a woman.
“She’s a Cool Girl. Cool Girl is
hot. Cool Girl is game. Cool Girl is
fun. Cool Girl never gets angry at
her man. She only smiles in a cha-
grin-loving manner and then pres-
ents her mouth for fucking.”
In many ways, this monologue
is an implicit way of exploring
womanhood through women’s
internalized
perceptions
of
femininity. While Amy Dunne
addresses the “cool girl” as a man-
made caricature, it isn’t purely a
consequence of misogynistic cli-
ches. Words like “cool girl” and
“pick-me,” or even the phenom-
enon of not being like other girls,
originate within female rela-
tionships. Words like “cool girl”
intrinsically create a standard of
womanhood because they con-
ditionalize what is “uncool” for
women to do. The monologue
unexpectedly sheds light on what
most truly helped me discover
womanhood: female friendships.
When we imply that desirability
is a competition, we internalize
the idea that friendships with
women are superficial.
My media consumption reaf-
firmed this notion throughout
much of my childhood and even
my adulthood. Although the
importance of female friendships
has become more intuitive over
the years, whenever I delve into
media from the ‘90s and 2000s,
I am reminded of the frivolous
portrayals of female friendships.
Regina
George’s
Burn
Book
in “Mean Girls” or the “guy’s
girl” trope of women preferring
“drama-free” friendships with
men perpetuated the idea that
befriending a woman was inher-
ently perplexing.
The quintessential “complex-
ity” of female friendships in
media boils down to superficial
interactions that are just another
manifestation of misogyny. The
mean girl friendships that rely
on social clout and backstabbing
behavior exist in a man-made
fantasy land. In this fantasy land
of “cool girls” and “uncool girls,”
men continually visualize female
friendships as a compilation of
shopping sprees and pajama par-
ties. Women are thought to only
interact with other women as a
means to compete for the atten-
tion of men. Portrayals of female
friendships are limited to “mind
games” and secret social cues,
reducing such relationships to
just another way women become
puzzles to men.
Having gone to an all-girls high
school, one would think I would
be well-versed in female friend-
ships. However, my high school
experience was overtaken by that
very unfortunate need to not be
“like other girls.” I was the social-
ly awkward brown girl freshly
moved to LA, and I disguised the
fact that I did not fit in by acting
like I actively chose not to fit in.
College redefined the importance
of female friendships for me in
more ways than I can count.
While all of my friendships in
college have taught me a myriad
of lessons, my friend Jinan is the
one who taught me how to actu-
alize all of those lessons. Jinan
burst my self-important, agoniz-
ing bubble and showed me that
the world was truly more than
feeling sorry for myself. As a naive
college freshman, she was my idol.
Although just a few years older
than me, it seemed that she was in
control over every part of her life
in ways I could only imagine for
myself. I was fascinated with the
way she did her hair, the way she
spoke and the divine grace she
carried herself with. In ways, I
wanted to be her, in another sense
I just wanted to know her.
She became my brown girl safe
space as I navigated various all-
white spaces. She taught me to
never attach my worth to the way
a white man sees me.
“He doesn’t look at you because
you’re brown, not because you
aren’t beautiful.”
I never knew how bonded my
soul could be to someone until
Jinan. Female friendships are the
most intimate and soul-bearing
human relationships. I can be
at my most vulnerable, and the
women in my life will lift me back
up while celebrating me at my
best. Every time I cry at parties,
Jinan holds me in her arms and
makes sure my mascara doesn’t
run. I call her after class to tell
her all about the dumb, ignorant
thing someone said in a discus-
sion. We lie in bed with facemasks
on, discussing everything from
our disagreements on philosophy
to anime recommendations.
“I love being a cunt,” she says.
“So do I.”
She has healed me in ways a
man never could.
Jinan broke down a lot of the
misconceptions I held about
befriending women. Beyond the
comfort and beauty I found in
our friendship, she showed me
so much about growing into my
womanhood. Instead of “blah
blah blah” she would say “blasé
blasé blah” so I started blasé-ing
my way through life as well. I
learned how to style myself, how
to make my presence known and
how to love things that other
women loved as well.
Although Jinan helped me
embrace my femininity through
my bimbo-ish ways of talking,
dressing and plainly existing, I
am critical of the way I have been
socialized ever since. I am often
met with comments that place my
interactions with certain women
directly under the scope of male
perception.
SHANIA BAWEJA
MiC Assistant Editor
Love Me Not
I thought I was in love with
a boy I met the summer before
starting high school. My teenage
self recognized love as insecurity
and misunderstanding and fight-
ing the night before final exams
because it felt so familiar to what
I had grown up with. I was the
manic pixie dream girl to his sad
boy, and I tried my best to stay
true to his idea of me. I talked him
down many a ledge, and I resented
him for it because I knew he would
never be able to do the same. At 16,
I was carrying the weight of the
world on my shoulders. I never
learned how to ask for help, and he
never bothered to notice. He swore
he loved me, but I don’t think he
knew what that meant. I don’t
say “I love you” as often anymore
because too many people don’t
know what it means. I’ve grown so
sick of love ever since.
The first time, I think, I was
truly in love was when I acci-
dentally fell for my best friend.
This kind of love wasn’t sicken-
ing, though. It was unspoken and
honest and kind. When the voices
in my head get too loud, she is my
peace. She was my freshman-year
roommate and the only person
who would understand my inner
turmoil the following summer.
Because misery demands com-
pany, we were inseparable in our
melancholia.
Summer
turned
to winter, and I fell in love with
the saddest version of us. I didn’t
realize I was in love until I had
extended myself too far. By no
fault of anyone but my own, I had
given far too much of myself to her,
and I was left with nothing for me.
That’s what you do when you’re
in love with your best friend, I
thought. I thought love traversed
all boundaries. I learned the hard
way that love cannot be boundless
if I myself am not whole. I’ll always
be in love with her, but I’ve grown
afraid of losing myself in love since
then.
I didn’t love myself when I
poured love into everyone around
me. From an early age, I was
indoctrinated
into
convoluted
ideas of love by the scars passed
down to me from my mother, her
mother and her mother. For all I
knew, love was meant to hurt. So,
I carry the wounds from my first
and most persisting heartbreak
in the palms of my hands. I force
my calloused fingers together in
prayer, begging religion to soften
my cold and uninviting touch. But
the closest thing I’ve come to faith
is believing my mother when she
told me her love was conditional.
Afraid and languished, I desper-
ately attempt to confess my own
declarations of love, but I don’t
have the best precedent for them.
My four years in college have
been the antithesis of love. Every
drunk kiss and swipe right was
a frantic pursuit to temporarily
pacify my emotional and sexual
frustration, and I never dealt with
it well the morning after. The sun
would glare at me in disapproval,
and the alarm in my head would
ring loud to remind me that the
body lying next to me was just
another number in a masochis-
tic game of dating app roulette.
By noon, the hangover from the
night’s capricious behavior would
fade, and the sounds of my televi-
sion would drown out any last bits
of remorse. Around midnight, I’d
hurl out another match to ease the
nauseating waves of desperation
and boredom.
I’d finally replaced love with
indifference.
My 20s feel tainted with cyni-
cism from my past experiences
with love (or lack thereof). I’d play
the cool girl because I could no
longer afford to get emotionally
invested. I resented my buckling
knees for not standing up on their
own, but I decided I’d never kneel
for love. I replaced piety with apa-
thy, sacrificing myself to carnal
temptation. But my exclusive flu-
ency in physical touch pleads like a
dead language that no one could be
bothered to transcribe. My body
had so much love to give to all the
wrong people, so I stay sickened by
and weary of whatever it is I hope-
lessly continue to pursue.
Months after another failed
affair, I steal a kiss with someone
behind a grimy bathroom stall,
and I fear a familiar cycle of self-
destruction. The walls pulse to the
bass of a song I catch myself sing-
ing along to, and we both stumble
out to different sinks, laughing to
each other in the mirror. The soft
lighting catches her eyes, and I
blush in colors of sapphic infatua-
tion.
We hold our heads at coffee the
next morning, but the hangover
dissipates into flighty eye contact
and toeing the line between play-
fulness and discomfort. I have
to sit on my hands to stop myself
from pulling her face into mine,
worried that she’ll read the karma
from my touch. After three short
hours of oversharing and trauma
bonding, we nod in agreement.
Girls should always go to the bath-
room together.
A few nights later, I pull up
outside her house, and my body
starts to panic. The sudden drops
of rain tapping on my windshield
match my elevated heart rate. My
breathing shallows, and I hold my
chest unsettled by the terror that
washes over me. I close my eyes for
a moment and revel in an all-too-
familiar sensation interrupting
my dogmatic slumber of tortured
numbness. The indifference had
suffocated me. She opens the pas-
senger door, and I let out a breath I
didn’t know I was holding in.
EASHETA SHAH
Former MiC Columnist
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