Well, that isn't exactly true. We had spent some time together as a group last week, but nothing special. Fate had driven us apart, but my heart was like me: stubborn, relentless. Always hoping for the best, but never quite being prepared for the worst.

Today, my heart had been shattered, again. It wasn't a new experience, I knew I wasn't the one who always got the "prize", but damned be me if I didn't hold my hopes as if I would be. 

It started fairly simply. "What are we doing after classes?" My best friend, my sister in the harshest of times, would ask.

"I'm game for anything." I hadn't been out in a while. College assignments and general stress had held me at bay. I needed a night out, and specifically, I needed a shot of tequila. Why, I couldn't quite tell, but my body simply demanded it. "I haven't gone out in a while. Won't complain if we go to a nightclub, ol' reliable, you know. It's nearby, entry is free today, why not go there and get wasted?"

"Says he who is constantly sick from the dumbest things." My friend remarked. And it was true. The weather was never kind to me, specially in times like these, where one day could switch from unbearable heat to freezing cold. 

"I'll manage. Trust me." I said smiling, confident in myself. If only this confidence would apply to more than my brain.

So we went out. The weather was tempered, neither hot not cold, but a light jacket was in order. I was picked up by my friend and him, and my emotions were at ease. The ride to the club was normal, we talked friends, acquaintances, toxic people, and general humor. These people made me feel at home, like I could be. Of course, my reason of being was a character, a façade of what I really felt like inside, yet I didn't dislike me. I still don't. 

We arrived late. We knew this nightclub was popular, and since tomorrow was a holiday, it wouldn't be an exaggeration to say most of the underground culture of the city was there. This was a place where a gaydar wasn't needed, everyone was true to themselves. The lines would stretch to the corner of the block and around, and the line with preferential access was longer than the one for everyone else. Though I was part of the minority that frequented this nightclub, I didn't quite feel at home. My way of being was one that would differ from the stereotype here, but I took pride in it. It was my positive distinctor, though more often than not, in places like these it played against me.

But I could always tell when looking at someone, whether I could approach them and have an outcome that was mutually enjoyed. And, of course, I knew him. I didn't need to tell, to figure. I was always aware, since that very first day, and that had been my burden since.

Part of me always wondered if he knew. I knew he knew, I had told him, but did he truly know? The extent to which he could look at me some way, and destroy every defense I had to watch my actions? To instantly shatter my demands to remain loyal to my brain rather than my heart?

I almost left them at the line. It was getting too late for my liking, and I told him I was going to leave. He threatened to tell my friend, and she was a force to be reckoned with when she was determined. But he didn't. 

Instead, he held my hand.

After what seemed like an hour, we were in the nightclub. My friend was well connected, and she knew that and made use of it. We got in the line, the preferential one, mind you, and we were ahead of all those who had been there far before us. In spaces like these, connections were all that mattered. While waiting though, I saw someone who interested me, but seemed like he was already taken. I kept my eye on him, and in all honesty, seeing what I thought was a relationship warmed my heart. I had broken up with my boyfriend a few weeks prior.

Once inside, I worked my way up the crowded stairs, and looked for my friends as they had gone in before me. The club was as I remembered, fairly small, with no changes beside a few new open doors to allow for more space. I made my way to the bar to get a drink, only to get ambushed by him through a hug in the back. I had kept an eye out for my friends, but there were nowhere to be found in the mass of people filling up the nightclub. But he could find me. He always could. 

I dared not make a move, after all, we knew what we were. Friends. Even if past history disputed it.

I ordered a drink, and went looked for our friend, my sister in all but blood, until she found us. We spent the better part of an hour dancing and walking, until I had to go the bathroom. Once I had gone and was walking back into the dance floot, as I passed the frame of the door dividing the bar from the bathroom corridor, he held my arm from behind me, but he wasn't alone. He was with my previous interest, and through a few questions I knew he wasn't taken. My instincts flew, I grabbed his hand and pulled him to the dance floor. In an instant, he and I were sharing drinks as we danced. We got close, I had his back on my hand and his neck on my lips, until he pushed me away. It wasn't violent, but a mere acknowledgement that that was as far as we were going. I didn't particularly care, apart from a "why" which never manifested in words. After all, I was the catch. 

But it felt good. Moments like these gave me life. Spontaneous action, forehead to forehead, hand in back and lips close enough to smell the alcohol in his breath. If only it had gone further.

I backed off, as I am not one to push clear boundaries. I sat down on a stool, and looked around. But then, my feelings went from indiference to jealousy. 

He was sharing his drink with him.

And I knew what that meant, where it would lead. I got up from the stool I had been sitting on since he pushed me away, and went to get a drink. I damn well knew what was going to happen. Unlucky me, however, found the bar at the other end of the club closed. I made my way back to where we were hanging out in the club, and my friend got to me first, asking where I had gone to. Almost as if to intercept me.

Not before I could catch a sight of them two.

My friend pulled me away, as the mental image of my former interest and him burnt itself in my brain. I had seen it before, but seeing him make out with someone who had rejected me had a special sting to it. It had never happened before. My friend knew how I felt about our mutual, so she dragged me away to the bar that was still open. She insisted on asking me what I wanted, then to look for someone who had come to be with her, but in my brain I could only look towards where my heart was being shattered. I looked, a morbid curiosity forged in the fires of jealousy, and my will was not strong enough. I witnessed it, and it broke me.

He was one of the two people who had such control over me, that I was unable to control myself.  I asked my friend to get me a bottle of water, and fled to the balcony when I knew I couldn't hold my eyes away. There, I texted my closest friend, and my heart cried. While no tears were shed, my heart felt a pain like it hadn't in some time. Like it hadn't when I broke up with my then-boyfriend. It was the shattering of an illusion, one which I had witnessed before, but had forgotten about. After all, unseeing eyes, unfeeling heart.

I reclined against the railing of the balcony, and wanted to cry. My gaze dropped, just as the perfect lyrics of the best song for the worst moment played: "We're nothing but we've been entangled for a while."

Though no tears had any intention of showing, I felt broken. But it wasn't something justifiable.

"Something may happen between us in the future, but don't wait for me." I remembered that phrase. I wanted to scream. But life had conditioned me to smile in moments like these. I tried my best, I really did, to reason my way out of these feelings, but they were strong. Strong enough to break me. To shatter me, to break me like I couldn't be broken by anyone. I stood against the railing watching someone dance from below and make gestures at me every so often. It helped, these little moments of distraction.

Then, he hugged me from behind. I thought it was her, having found me after leaving the bar on the verge of tears that didn't dare manifest. But life refused to be so boring. It was him. 

And just off the corner of my eye, I saw the other one. Not daring to approach me, keeping his distance. Maybe he knew, maybe he could tell past a façade. My mask was unbreachable, but I had made a move on him, and his little insight might have revealed me.

"What's wrong?"

I smiled. I wasn't about to be honest, I already had been, and so had he. But my heart refused to accept his words then.

"I just needed some air. I'm fine." I lied through my teeth, smiling. If nothing else, I was an excellent liar. I didn't take pleasure in it.

He spoke some more words to me, which my brain refused to catch, and then vanished into the club with the other one, my brain bringing up the possibility of the most deep cut that could possibly be etched on my heart. It was ridiculous. I didn't own him, these emotions were not defensible. But he owned me. He just didn't know.

I turned again towards the balcony, and dropped my head. I felt a light tapping on my arm, and she was there. In my anguish, she brought me my water. Bless her, she remembered. 

But I couldn't take it. I thanked her, and the moment she turned away into an interest of herself, I left. I walked down the stairs, panic ready in my brain should I come across them as I made my way out, and ordered a ride home.

In it, I was dumbfounded. I knew we were friends, and that was about it, but he was the one other person who was in complete control of me. Unknowingly, unwanting, he could shatter me into a thousand pieces.

And shattered I was. All I could think about, the whole ride home in a stranger's car with my phone facing down so I wouldn't see any messages, especially his, was a line I had found especially touching:

"What is this feeling? I do not want it!"