It was the third week of summer, I was heartbroken and holding onto hope. I had just had my first real breakup and my heart felt as if it was just put through the blender, the garbage disposal and just for the fun of it, I’ll say there were tire tracks on my heart too. I was in bad shape and I wanted nothing to do with life. In a desperate attempt to improve my mental state, my savior, Jaffe, invited me out with another one of his friends- someone who I was not super close with and who I had previously not liked. When I first met Elizabeth, I was jealous. She had a relationship with my ex that I could never have. They were best friends and it killed me knowing that she still had him and I didn’t. When Jaffe informed me that she would be there, I said ‘Why the hell not’ and decided to take the plunge. I wanted to do this for myself, I knew I had to get out. Unsurprisingly, he succeeded in his attempts, and together they began to patch the hole in my ruptured heart. We talked for hours and their laughs and smiles were contagious. I wanted the feeling I got with them to last forever. 

As the night crept on, Elizabeth noticed that the heartbreaker was starting to creep into my thoughts. Once my opposition, now only she could overlook my worn out smile. I wanted to go back in time and take back every negative thing I thought about her. 

She turned to me, looked straight into my eyes and declared, “Ella, you are such a strong person and have one of the brightest souls I have ever met. You do not need anyone in your life who isn’t going to continuously bring you as much positivity as you bring to them.” Each word chiseled away bits and bits of the dam I had built at the start of the night. By the time Elizabeth had finished her thought, not only were we at her house but I was also in tears. As she reluctantly got out of the car, she pulled me out with her and pulled me straight into a hug. We stayed like that for a long time. She didn’t care though; she let me cry into her shoulder and allowed me to hang on until I could let go. 

“This is me letting go Elizabeth,” I sobbed into her dampened shoulder. She nodded and pulled me in tighter. I wanted her to know that I was giving the care I had for him to her, and when I heard her sniffle, I knew she understood what I had done. 

“You are going to find someone who radiates as much happiness as you do.” She pulled away, wiped my tears, and finished the night by maintaining, “they will treat you how you deserve to be treated, and that is nothing but the best.”

Letting go is not weak; letting go is the complete opposite of weak. Letting go of toxic people and having the courage to carry on without someone you love is one of the strongest things a person can do. There will come a time when everyone comes face to face with one of life's worse challenges- do I hold onto hope or do I let go? I hope everyone realizes their self worth and lets go; if it was worth it at all, there would be no question at all. 

It was still the third week of summer, yet my heart hurt a lot less, I gained a new best friend, and this time the hope wasn’t for him, it was for me- all because of someone I thought I hated.