I’ve been thinking about the things I lose and the things I’ve lost and the difference between the two. Things I lose can be regained. I lose my chapstick several times a day. Within a few hours, I come upon it folded into the fabric of my jacket pocket or behind the candles on my desk. Then I have my chapstick back. You can get back the things you lose, no matter how many times you lose them. On the other hand, things you’ve lost are gone. They are abruptly and permanently missing. I’ve lost my eyesight, which used to be 20/20. Now, I never again will be able to make sense of our spice rack if I’m not wearing my glasses. Because I have lost my eyesight.
Sometimes things end up lost because I don’t know the rules. When I started wearing makeup in sixth grade, I thought I would maintain control. But I have worn it nearly every day since, and now I hate my mirror reflection when its not wearing mascara. Something there was lost. I wonder if I would have known the rules–that after that first time, I would permanently feel a suffocating obligation to paint my eyelashes blacker and longer every morning–I still would have smuggled that pink and green tube into the middle school bathroom so I could put it on without my mom seeing. I was so rushed to grow out of a version of myself that I am now nostalgic for. This same thing happened to me with lip liner, hair dye, push-up bras, and collagen gummies. The first time I did it, I discovered a new iteration of myself, beautiful in the way other girls are beautiful, and I lost the version of myself that was beautiful in its own unique way.
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I just got my box of stuff back. The favorite books I loaned her, the nail polish that was more her color than mine, the Winnie the Pooh figurines I bought her that used to dance on her window sill, and plenty of clothes. My clothes were so oversized on her, she looked like a four year old playing dress up in her mom’s closet. I think part of her felt guilty that she always wore my clothes, like she was depriving me of my possessions. That’s why she liked the goose sweater. Because I had the same sweater in two colors, so she got the blue goose sweater and I got the black goose sweater. And she could wear that goose sweater all she wanted and be comfortable knowing I had one to wear too if I ever wanted.
The blue goose sweater was not in my box. I suppose she kept it. This is the main reason why I think it’s ok that I kept the vibrator.
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She got me the vibrator because she has two at her apartment and I had none at mine. She paid extra for it to be USB chargeable because we’d “save money on batteries in the long run.” Now, is a goose sweater equivalent to a vibrator? This is an exclusively dyke problem. Straight couples don’t write heartfelt essays comparing goose sweaters to vibrators after a break up. But it’s actually more complicated than you’d think:
You ask, “Why would she even want the vibrator back?”
Why would I even want the goose sweater back? It’s not like I could bear wearing it now. It is no longer My Goose Sweater, it is My Ex’s Goose Sweater I Fought to Get Back. I could never ever wear it without thinking of her. And if I’m being honest, really honest, it looks better on her anyways.
“But the vibrator was a gift.”
She probably thinks the goose sweater was a gift. I did say, “the blue one is yours and the black one is mine.” I specifically remember using the word “yours.” I should have been more specific and said, “the blue one is yours as long as we are still in love or even just on speaking terms.”
She used the word “yours” with the vibrator too. I remember that. But maybe she’s sitting in her apartment right now thinking, “I should have been more specific and said, ‘its yours as long as you haven’t blocked me on Instagram and thrown away my love letters.’”
“But she already has two vibrators at home!”
I know! That’s why she bought me one in the first place! But this one has more settings and is waterproof and I don’t think her others are waterproof. Just like the blue goose sweater is better for early spring months like February and March while the black goose sweater is best for late fall. Everything has a purpose and nothing has the exact same purpose.
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I decided to keep the vibrator. I decided it was ok as long as I accepted that it was ok she kept the blue goose sweater. And that was the end of things. Until this morning.
This morning I was cleaning my room and I saw a book that had gotten caught under my bed. It was her book. One of her favorite books. She had written notes on every page and highlighted quotes and drawn pictures where she thought it needed pictures, so its not like she can just buy another copy. I am devastated. This is such an intimate thing of hers to keep.
Suddenly, it feels kinda fucked up that I kept the vibrator.
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Now we’ve found a third category: Things you lose, things you’ve lost, and things that have been taken from you. Things that have been taken from you are very similar to things that have been lost–they are gone and will remain that way. But when things are taken, you don’t have any say in the matter. Someone else chooses to take something from you. This one isn’t up to you at all. It isn’t your accident, like misplacing chapstick, and it isn’t your choice, like wearing mascara. It’s someone else’s conscious decision to pull something from your possession.
When Kylee H. never returned my eyeshadow palette she borrowed in fourth grade, something was taken from me.
When Dylan M. was so shocked that I had never seen a porn that he immediately showed me a video on his cellphone of a girl giving a blowjob, something was taken from me.
And as I stood in my room this morning, holding that book–holding her favorite book–I realized I have taken something from her. She loses books all the time, so I can just imagine her searching her apartment, looking under couches and in the bottom of boxes, patiently waiting for this book to pop back up. She doesn’t realize I took it. I accidentally took it, but I took it. I also took the vibrator. And I took maybe a million other things from her that I’ll never even fully realize. Maybe I took her favorite Sammy Rae song. Because she showed it to me and I loved it so much I made it our alarm in the morning, and now maybe she can never listen to it again without thinking about me and that really shitty thing I said to her on the roof. Maybe I took the bookstore on 39th street. Maybe I took pancakes. Maybe I took the stars. Maybe I’m narcissistically overinflating how significant I actually am to her, and she’s blissfully reading books I recommended to her and watching TV shows we used to watch together. All I know is that now I can’t even wear my black goose sweater without thinking of the blue sweater without thinking of that horrible thing she did to me in Philadelphia. So with regards to the goose sweater, and with regards to many other things, she definitely took something from me.
I think perhaps love is just letting someone take from you. It’s bringing them to your favorite restaurant and knowing that if things go poorly, those brussel sprouts you always order will never taste the same. If that’s not what love is, then it’s sure as hell what heartbreak is.
Megan Cox is a B.A. English student class of 2022 and her work has been featured in Canyon Voices, UCSD’s The Guardian, and The MQ. She is a contributing writer to The Hard Times satire site and Here Is What I Know lifestyle blog. An editor once referred to her style as “lesbian Judd Apatow” and one note from a peer called her work “violently personal,”.