Last Fall

Empty

December

One month passed and after being so attached to someone else for so long, I realized now that I didn't know how to be on my own. I couldn't fall back on love whenever I needed to. It was over. Security, certainty and comfort were gone. I had given them up without so much as a second thought and I had taken them from her as well the day I ended things. I'd left her before, but this time was different. She wasn't going to come running back. She wasn't going to stay. I made her go. I didn't chose her up against the things I couldn't see. I put them first. I let them in and I let them win.

January

Two months passed and adjusting was strange. The outburst on social media as a result of our separation lead to my taking a step back. I stopped sharing anything personal with the world and kept to myself. Perhaps the most significant change was two months after the apocalyptic breakup Sam stopped touring with us as our official photographer. The band played shows, but embarking on our first headliner without the first person to ever shoot us in action was not how I'd imagined it. She wanted a break, which she deserved, but more so she wanted to go home and that's when I realized we weren't her home anymore. The connection wasn't the same. She wanted to be with her boyfriend and her sister. We weren't competition, not that we were competing, but she was taking an undefined extended leave of absence and it felt fairly permanent.

New videographers were lined up. They were friends, talented ones, but the vibe and overall ambiance to what they captured didn't reflect the essence of pvris quite like the past. Alexa had a way of filming that never interfered with our performance. She knew the stage like we did, she was who taught me confidence when I was eighteen. In my metalcore years, fifteen to seventeen, I'd been so used to standing to the side with my keyboard or guitar that when I took the status of front woman at eighteen I didn't know how to command an audience. She'd been L,R's center stage for seven, nearly eight, years when we met and carried every performance.

Replacements solely worked on their craft and didn't have the experience she did, what being one with me. She was part of my influence for everything I created and that gave her an insight and an understanding of me and my vision for the band that others wouldn't get. Sam too, she helped shape our image. The band's social media was her photography and Alexa's nightly tour videos by city. That's what fans saw, so what became a staple for us was credit to them. Nothing could replicate that magic.

February

Three months passed and I never moved from a standstill. I'd work- sound check, payed meet and greets that I swore against for years but caved due to lacking the will to fight, shows where I played guitar less and less and pushed my vocals to their peak. I took less interviews, I deleted sass queen out of my bio on tumblr and made all my social media strictly business, no longer having the time of day to be anything but a washed up sellout of all I once valued in myself. And people loved it. My new tired attitude was coined as mystery. I went from outspoken and badass to quiet and potentially dangerous.

My makeup got darker to match the sleep deprivation shading under my eyes. I lost my tan and ditched the endearing button downs, shorts, thigh highs and converse for jeans, crop tops, leather jackets and boots to hide my ivory skin. My hair had grown out and lightened to it's natural blonde highlighted medium brown, so I dyed it raven, the darkest I had dared. I stopped tying my mane in a bun, instead letting it hang down my back, unwashed and overgrown. As I thinly traced my lid and waterline with a charcoal pencil, it hit me that I wasn't furthering myself from who she fell in love with, I was becoming who I fell in love with. I was b.a.d. and it was then I accepted that even without her she was still here.

March

Four months passed and I flew to Boston for my birthday because my dad and brother hadn't seen me since before the breakup and they insisted. Nate picked me up at the airport in the morning and drove us back to Lowell. We didn't talk apart from exchanging hellos until we were in the car.