If you haven't read Part One, please do so here. There are a lot of metaphors I'm really proud of that won't make sense without the first half of the story.
We'd finally admitted it.
After three tumultuous years, we'd finally agreed that we were, in fact, squinting too hard to make our relationship work. The puzzle pieces we'd been forcing together did actually belong to different puzzles. Now it was time to sort them into separate boxes and be on our way.
Turns out, we were really bad at doing that, and since I had nowhere to stay until my lease started, we awkwardly returned to his apartment. Neither of us spoke much that first night as we crawled into his bed. Even though we were over, my perplexed heart still wanted to be close to him. But after an awkward week of polite waltzing around yet another forced shared space, I finally moved into my new apartment.
My two other roommates were a few days behind, so I had an entire three-bedroom on the Upper West Side to myself. I thought I'd love it, but it turns out there's nothing so torturous as starting your heartbreak in an empty and unfamiliar home. My first night, I stayed up until 3 am painting my bedroom and staving off tears, until they broke through and I finally crashed out atop my mattress on the living room floor.
Over the next few weeks, Casey and I tried to be as mature about our breakup as we had been about our relationship. Since we'd decided this together, we figured we'd be able to navigate it with ease. We figured that we could still be friends. Hell, we could probably still have sex. That would be super mature, right?
Turns out, we were firmly in denial and unable to move through it until a fateful family road trip.
Nestled in the back of my sister's car, driving from Oregon to California, I listened to my family talk about their own relationships. As I stared out at the pine trees blurring by, I registered what they were talking about in a new light. The breakup had given me new clarity, but I was utterly confused about what to do with this newfound information. On one hand, I was hopeful; on the other, trepidatious.
When I returned home to NYC, I printed out what I'd learned in a letter titled "A Case Study of the Whartons," texted Casey to meet, and hopped on the subway to Astoria Park.
I will never forget how he looked that day. Dressed in all-white athletic gear, he oozed the irresistible charm that only an ex who's doing well can have. My heart started pounding for him in a way it hadn't for a very long time.
As we settled on the grass, I took out my letter and asked him not to respond until I'd finished talking. I started, telling him of the trip and what I'd learned from my family's own trials. In the back seat of that car, I'd heard each family member talk about the same things that I was going through. The same themes they were discussing were the same reasons I'd broken up with Casey.
Casey had a tendency to be self-focused, which made me feel unappreciated and unseen. Casey needed a lot of time to himself, which made me feel isolated and unwanted. Turns out those are dealbreakers for all the Whartons.
But hearing my family talk, I realized that if I ever wanted to solve those problems, I'd need to face them head-on, and I wanted to do that with Casey. So, at the end of my letter, my voice cracking, I nervously asked if we could get back together. He was quiet for a moment before looking at me with sad eyes and saying he was sorry, but he didn't want to get back together. He wasn't sure he ever would. I winced back my disappointment and naturally went back to his place for another round of breakup sex.
To add insult to injury, a few days later, he came over to tell me, for real this time, that we needed to stop talking. I capitulated, tired of this endless back and forth, then, in a final betrayal, he told me he was headed to our friend's house in the Pines. That straw sent me careening into vengeful heartbreak.
What had been building in me for six months was finally unleashed, and I ran headfirst into my grief. Once Casey left, I took to a midnight Central Park, sobbing in anguish, and grateful that no one was around to witness my descent. I cried for a future that would no longer bear fruit. I grieved for a past that was irrevocably changed. And I mourned a present that no longer included my best friend.
But as the tears subsided over the next few days, I committed to working through this chapter in the most impressive, healthy, mature way I could. I went out and bought books about breakups (Burnout by the Nagoski sisters is a must-read). I listened to podcast after podcast. I surrounded myself with friends. I threw myself into the gym. I started therapy. I reconnected with old friends whom I'd let fall by the wayside. I made new friends. I spent almost every afternoon on the Hudson River with the New York Outrigger Canoe Club. I was doing everything I could, not to avoid the heartbreak, but to move through it.
But as hard as I tried, it would rear its head constantly. Casey could be the furthest thing from my mind until I saw something I wanted to share with him. Who could I tell about the funny pigeon on the sidewalk or that the burger place we'd always talked about finally opened? Instead of ways to connect with him, these became stark reminders of the relationship I'd lost. Even now, my phone is filled with pictures of things I wanted to show him, but never sent. Each photo, a placebo for my broken heart.
Whenever this happened, I turned to my favorite form of stimulation: podcasts. I became obsessed with one called "Better Because of It," stories of breakups and how each person ended up grateful in the end. I savored each episode, rolling them around in my brain as I spent time and tears with these auditory strangers, letting each one live with me for a few days before cueing the next.
The last episode is the story everyone wants: a couple who realize their breakup was just what they needed to get back together. When I heard it, I cried (again), longing for that to be our fate.
Now, this is the point where I wish I could say that deep down, I always knew that Casey and I would get back together, but I didn't. I truly believed that we were done, starting our new lives without each other. And I think that's what would have happened if I hadn't gone on one more fateful adventure.
In early July, my friend Joseph invited me on a trip with his friends to an island in a lake, where six out of the eight of us were deep in the throes of messy breakups. So we did what any group of almost strangers would do: we took Molly, danced in the woods, and cuddled on the floor, listening to music while staring at lights on the ceiling. We allowed ourselves to be vulnerable and intimate in a way that only people desperate for connection can.
On that trip, I found a version of myself that was only visible through the eyes of strangers becoming friends. Back in the city, we became a little squad, going out dancing, making art together, adventuring on Fire Island. With these new friends, I was starting to find out who I was on my own, and I loved that person.
So, when Casey texted me one late July day, asking to get lunch, I was hesitant, unwilling to give up my newfound independence, but I agreed anyway. That morning, I dressed as 'new Aidan,' complete with this gold necklace that had become emblematic of who I'd become. The longing for him that I'd so publicly displayed when I read my letter was gone, replaced by a steadiness of spirit.
At a trendy lunch in Chelsea, we talked for hours before strolling to Union Square, and as much as I tried to remain steady, our old habits kicked right back in. It was a parallel of our first date. The fascinated talking, the uncontrollable giggling, the nervous kissing.
We got to meet each other again.
Now, we didn't get back together immediately. We were wary, so we agreed to take things slow, to rebuild with care and patience. But we rode our giddy endorphins and started the process, with a conscious, deliberate commitment to each other.
I retained the lessons I'd written about in my letter and continued to develop my autonomy while he explored what he really wanted. But sometimes the line between what he said he wanted and what he did blurred too much, so I asked him to go to therapy. I needed a clarity that I wasn't getting.
Those first months back, we'd still have conversations about our mismatched futures, but they happened less and less. Finally, in February of 2022, we met our final hurdle. As our lease renewals drew nearer, Casey told me that he wasn't sure if he wanted to move in with me again. The trauma of our COVID cohabitation was a specter looming over us both. He thought maybe we could be a couple who had two separate apartments. For him, this was a bold new relationship structure. For me, I just saw that same door he was keeping his foot wedged firmly into.
So, with an agency bred from our time apart, I gave him an ultimatum. I told him that if he didn't see a future with us living together, that wasn't a future I was interested in. He took a moment, mulled it over, then agreed, taking his foot out of the door and closing it for good.
That is when our second relationship truly began. We didn't move in together for a while after, but it signified a huge shift for both of us: Casey's leap of faith to build a life with me, and my ability to stand up for my needs.
Of course, like any relationship, we still have our challenges. We still find ourselves in deep conversations, wondering if the futures we want are exactly the same. But now the details are smaller and the stakes are lower.
We're no longer exploring whether or not our puzzle pieces fit together. We know they do. And they fit perfectly, stronger for the little bit of force it took to put them together in the first place. Now, when I think about the puzzle that is our relationship, it's not finished, not even close, but I can already tell the image that's taking shape, it's rich and complex and full of depth.
It's not a Seeing Eye poster like we thought. It's a sunset in perfect definition. The same one that we would sit and watch each night in Hawaii. Just us, on a rocky shore, in contented silence, listening to the soothing crash of the waves.
Now, if we're squinting, it's not because we're trying to see our relationship. We're squinting because our future, like the sunset on the horizon, is shining bright on a sea of endless possibility.
P.S. As you can tell, Casey and I have put a lot of concentrated thought into how we craft our relationship. We’ve spent countless hours talking about how to make sure it is exactly the one we want to go through our lives in.
And we’ve put that same thought into our wedding. So next week, while I’ll be offline quite a bit, stay tuned as next Wednesday we’ll be sharing a bit of behind-the-scenes of how we put our wedding together, all that that entails, and some other fun treats as well!
Talk to you soon!
This is why I only read low angst novels... I've been waiting on the edge of my seat for your part 2 hoping it all works out for you both even though you TOLD me it does from the beginning. But I digress...
This is such a real, raw, and beautiful story and reminds me of my favorite relationship quote:
"Love does not consist of gazing at each other, but in looking outward together in the same direction."
-Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
I've been married for 14 years and it's work to keep your puzzle pieces fitting as you grow and change, but, damn, is it worth it.
Congrats and wishing you all best sunsets.
Y’all are a great model for how to construct the foundation to a good and lasting relationship. You should market this (in a good way). Podcast, maybe??!