I held on as best I could. Played a role, as if on stage. Smiled at classmates, joked with friends, even winked at myself in the mirror — but I knew it was only a mask. I was no longer myself. Just a shell imitating life. At times I fell. Deeply. Into myself. Sometimes so far that I didn't know how to rise, how to climb out of that pit of pain and longing. On such nights I would go to the places where we had once been happy. Where we laughed together, sitting on a bench with paper cups of ice cream, where she wrapped her arms around my neck and whispered little mischiefs. I stared at those places as if hoping to see her there, like a phantom, like a shadow of the past. It was like a forgotten fairy tale, where I had once been the hero, and she — the light that illuminated everything around.
And I drank. Drank until I lost myself, until thoughts quieted, giving way to a resounding silence. Until the pain receded — not forever, but at least for the evening. Then came the exhaustion. Heavy, viscous, almost physical. And after it — emptiness. Silent, icy, enveloping from head to toe. Emptiness in which I was alone. Completely. And there was nothing I could do about it.
One day my mother came. She saw me — burned out, broken, with empty eyes from which the light had gone — and asked not a single question. She simply called my father. He rushed in so quickly, as if he knew that if not now — maybe never. He tried to talk to me, persuade me, shake me. His voice sounded louder than everything inside me. At first, I pushed him away. Silently. Harshly. But he did not give up and stayed. We rented an apartment and began living together. It was strange — to be a son again. To hear someone cooking you dinner again, for the first time in eight years. To hear someone say: "Time for bed." To scold you for socks left lying around. To care. And that became my salvation.
To distract me, my father pulled me into his work. He opened a branch in this city, slowly began introducing me to it, giving me time to adjust. And I began to get involved. Slowly, cautiously, with distrust — but I began. For the first time in a long while, I had something I could hold on to. I started studying again, working. I got up in the morning not just to drag myself through another day, but to do something, however small, however slightly meaningful.
My father didn't overload me. He felt me. But day by day I took on more. Began to influence processes, to feel needed. Became part of something. And although our branch didn't bring loud success, it lived, it grew. He was proud of me. And my mother too. In their eyes, I was doing well. I had managed. Rose from the ashes. But for me, all of it was not a victory, but only a way not to lose my mind. A way not to dissolve in the loneliness left behind by her absence. Because I still didn't know where she was, what had become of her, and where, and how was Katrin. My Rebel Girl.
I haven't had any relationships. Yes, there were girls — attentive, beautiful, sincere. A few times they themselves made a move, suggested something more, but I refused. Even the thought of touching another caused inner resistance, almost disgust. Not because they weren't good enough, but because they weren't her. Even a fleeting thought of another scent, other lips, other hands felt like betrayal. Not betrayal of her, but of myself. Because everything in me — everything that hadn't died — belonged only to her.
My mother tried. She pushed me. Persuaded me to go on a date, to start with friendship. She thought that time heals. But she don't understand. She couldn't understand. She didn't know that in Katrin I had found an entire universe. She wasn't just a girl. She was my meaning, my hope, my breath. Katrin was the light that warmed me on the darkest days, and the rain that cleansed me, washing away everything unnecessary. She was the air. And her leaving didn't stop that. I waited. Like Hachiko. Faithfully, devotedly. Without looking back.
The fact that she physically left didn't mean that she had left my heart. It didn't mean that I had let her go. I couldn't. Because her voice was still echoing within me. Her touches were my skin. Her light — my eyes. Everything in me was about her. I still belonged to her. My soul, my heart, my body — all wanted only her. No one else. It wasn't just a feeling. It was a need. Vital, like water, like air. Without her, I didn't know how to exist. Because we weren't "Rebel Girl and I." We were one. She was me. And I was hers. Forever.
Vi. He was the only one who somehow supported me, even though he couldn't do anything to change what was happening. His help was especially important when, during another breakdown, I drank so much that I felt so bad I wanted to leave. And he saved me — saved me with conversations that, although they couldn't bring her back, at least distracted me a little from the madness. If it weren't for him, I definitely wouldn't be alive. He picked me up in that state, took me either to the dormitory or to his place, without asking and without judging. He was just there.
We constantly called each other, talked. Sometimes he sent me photos, snippets of their phone conversations — the ones he recorded and cut so that I wouldn't hear too much. Vi was like a caring grandfather, who calms, who hurries to help, who instills in me at least some hope. Hope for something better. And the best for me had always been only her.
Right now, I am looking at a new photograph of my Rebel Girl, where she is smiling—so sincerely, so truly, as only she can. Her eyes shine with warmth and freedom, and a whole universe lives within them—my universe. It seems as if she is about to laugh out loud, and I hear her voice, so familiar, beloved, painfully known. She is beautiful… wild in her own way, untamed and real. I feel her energy, like an invisible spark, transferring to me, making my heart beat faster. I sense her laughter, as if it still lingers in the air, filling the space with her presence.
How much I miss her. This longing creeps in unnoticed, piercing my chest like a sharp blade. My heart tightens with pain and tenderness at the same time—as if time has stopped and the whole world has frozen in this single moment. I want to hide from everything—from the noise, from unfamiliar faces, from reality—and simply dissolve into her memories. In the scent of her hair. In her laughter. In those fleeting glances that warm better than any words. I feel how this emptiness she left behind squeezes me, not letting me breathe, and at the same time, how it fills every corner of my being.
But even through this pain, I know—she is with me. Wherever she is, I feel her, as if a thin, invisible thread connects our souls. And I wait for her. No matter how much time passed. Because in this world and any other—she will always be mine. And I—hers. And that thought warms me, giving me the strength to carry on.