I have butterflies in my stomach.
They’re not even the good butterflies; the kind that make you feel excited or happy, and brush their wings up against you, soft and tingly. My butterflies are the flesh-eating kind; the kind of butterflies with wings made of glass, that chew holes in your lungs.
I have butterflies in my stomach because in less than five minutes Adam is going to walk through the bakery door. Adam, who I haven’t seen for more than a month, who I was in love with for more than five years. Adam, who broke my heart, and whose heart I broke.
My hands tighten around the cup of hot chocolate I ordered when I got here, and I lean back in my chair as I wait for Adam.
I’m alone in the bakery except for the worker who took my order, and an older couple who are sitting at a table by the wall. They smiled at me when I walked in, but that small act of kindness did little to tame the manic butterflies threatening to destroy me from the inside out before Adam even gets here.
A bell rings throughout the room, and a cold rush of air blows in. My gaze turns towards him automatically because for the past five years he was my favorite person and the one I always wanted to see.
My eyes travel from the top of his head down to his shoes; his dirty blond hair looking like he’d run his hands through it a thousand times, and his green eyes are dimmer than normal, the violet specks in them almost nonexistent. He’s in jeans and a green flannel I remember picking out. My gaze lands back on his, and I can tell he’s been doing the same thing I just was - taking in my appearance. I wonder what he thinks of my curly red hair sticking out from underneath the black winter hat I put on this morning to try and tame it, or what he thinks of the wool leggings I wore and the oversized sweater.
“Hey Emery,” he says, the first words he’s spoken to me in what feels like forever.
“Hi Adam,” I reply, because the butterflies have chewed a thousand holes inside my lungs, and I’m struggling to form even the simplest of words.
He sits down across from me, laying his hands flat on the table. I keep mine wrapped tightly around my cup of cooling hot chocolate. 
“How are you?” He asks.
Awful.
Tired.
Missing you.
“I’m okay,” I reply. “How are you? Do you want anything to drink?”
He shakes his head slowly, his eyes never leaving mine, “I’m okay, and no thanks to the drink.”
We're silent for a few moments. I take a sip of my hot chocolate, and Adam watches. I glance away from his sharp gaze, and look towards the older couple sitting against the wall. They're holding hands across the table and sharing a newspaper, the man reading parts of it while the woman does the crossword. They both look so content to just be there, holding each other's hand in the silence, while they each focus on their part of the newspaper.
I turn to look back at Adam, and see him watching the old couple too, his eyes sad and his jaw clenched. He catches me watching him and quickly looks away towards the window, and I take another sip of my hot chocolate, a vain attempt to drown the butterflies who are trying to crawl their way up my throat.
"Remember when I'd hold your hand for no reason at all?" Adam breaks the silence, and I almost wish he hadn't. He keeps staring out the window at the winter wonderland that’s being created out there. "We'd be sitting at the dinner table, or lying on the couch, or riding in the back of a taxi, and I'd always reach over and take your hand, just to be able to feel that you were alive and next to me, and that we were together."
"Adam," I begin to say, the butterflies choking my words before I can get anymore out.
"I'm sorry, I just... I just wish I could still do that." His voice is quiet and soft, and I glance down at his hands laying flat on the table, and I remember what it felt like to hold his hand too. How I'd lace my fingers through his, and how our hands seemed to fit so perfectly together that it would have seemed so improbable to think that someday we’d barely be able to look at each other, let alone hold hands. But I remember how it felt to hold Adam’s hand, how I’d do it just because I wanted to, as if I thought I needed someone to testify to the fact that I was here, on this Earth, with exactly who I wanted to be with.
My hands loosen around my cup, and one falls to the table, where I move it until it's right across from his; both our palms flat against the table, the tips of our fingers almost touching, but not quite. Neither of us moves, and we both know that neither of us is going to. This is as close as we'll come to ever holding hands again.
Being with Adam was the most exciting thing I've done so far in my life. But it was also the most draining. Being together since junior year of high school, ending up at colleges thirty minutes away from each other, making it work for three years at those colleges -  it was the best, and worst, decision we could have made. We both know it. We both realized it. Just a little too late.
Everything exploded one night a little over a month ago. We both had so much pent-up anger and frustration and sadness towards each other already, but we just kept letting it pile up and pretended that everything was fine.
I screamed. He shouted. I cried. He pounded on the wall. I stayed. He left.
The next day was when the butterflies made their first appearance inside me. As if my heart hadn’t been shredded enough already, they made themselves at home inside my chest and haven’t left since.
Adam lets out a breath, and slowly drags his hands across the table, away from mine. I pull mine back as well, and I hope he can’t see how much it’s shaking.
He starts and stops talking a few times before finally settling on the right words he wants to say, “You were happy, in the beginning at least, right Em?”
“Of course I was, Adam.” I say, my eyes watering already. “You made me so happy.”
“I’m glad.” The corners of his lips turn up in a small smile, and my butterflies are thrown into a frenzy because I remember that smile. All the times I'd wake up and find him already awake, already smiling at me, ensuring that I was going to have a good day. And when I'd surprise him after his classes and take him out for lunch, and he'd smile at me from across the table while holding my hand. But more than any other moment, I remember how he'd smile before I kissed him. Every time, like the first time all over again, I could feel the smile on his lips, feel how happy he was to be kissing me, to be with me.
My heart stops and starts and stops again, because of how much I love him, but also because of how much I need to let him go.
“Adam, even with everything that happened, especially at the end, I want to thank you from the bottom of my heart.”
“For what?” His eyebrows furrow together and I can see the dimple in his forehead that comes out whenever he’s confused about something, and I almost can’t keep going. Almost. 
“For being with me. I didn’t realize it until after, but I think I needed it - I think we both needed it. To be together in this life, even if it was only for a little while.”
His jaw clenches, but he nods his head slowly, and I let out a slow breath.
“I wish things could be different.” He says quietly, almost like he doesn’t want me to hear.
“I know. Me too.” And I do wish that things could have turned out differently for us. I think even my butterflies wish it too, their wings beating softer now against my chest.
“I’m sorry for what I did to us Emery, I-” He blurts out, and I stop him as soon as I hear what he’s about to say.
“We both did this to us, Adam. It’s not all on you.”
“But I walked away, and left you all alone.”
“And maybe I needed to be alone for a little while.” I admit. “Maybe we both did. We’d been together since junior year of high school. We’re seniors in college now, Adam. Maybe we need to learn how to be apart, how to be alone for a little bit. That’s not a bad thing.”
He’s silent, but his eyes are softer now, the violet specks swimming in with the green.
“I love you Adam.” I say, and his whole body jolts from my confession. I wasn’t going to say it, but I couldn’t keep it in anymore, after having kept it in for the past month. “I’ll always love you, because you’re my first love, which is the most important one.”
“Even more important than the last?” He asks, and I smile softly, my voice shaking when I respond.
“Absolutely. You taught me how to love. You changed my life Adam, and I’ll always be grateful to you for that.”
He smiles briefly back at me, but then his smile fades, taking mine with it. “You know, I always thought that I’d be your first love, and your last.”
“I know. I thought so too, for a little while.” I could almost imagine it: me and Adam, living a life together. Walking down an aisle towards him, building a house and a family with him. Growing old with him by my side. If only.
I glance towards the old couple again, who are still sitting side by side, holding hands, except now the man is helping his wife with the crossword puzzle, and they’re smiling and laughing as they try to figure it all out.
“That was never going to be us, was it?” Adam asks, and I know he’s looking at them too. I wonder if his heart is filled with as much envy for that couple as mine is.
“I don’t know. I think we both wanted it to be. Maybe we just wanted it too much.” I say, finally looking away from them and back to Adam.
We sit in silence. A comfortable silence, but one that has to end at some point.
“This is it, isn’t it?” He asks, even though we both already know the answer.
“I think so.”
He nods his head, “I’ll miss you, Emery. Everyday probably, for a while at least. I’ll miss waking up to your crazy red hair every morning, and I’ll miss having your beautiful eyes be the very last thing I see before I go to sleep at night. But mostly I’ll miss just knowing that you’re there, for me to talk to or just hold.”
Tears are running freely down my cheeks now and I’m not trying to stop them, or hide them, because I can see that Adam has some in his eyes too.
“I’m going to miss you too, Adam. So much. I’ll miss the notes you’d leave for me around the apartment, and I’ll miss getting to lay with you on the couch after a long day, and just hear your breathing, and count your heartbeats. And all the desserts you’d make, I’ll definitely miss those too.”
He laughs, an actual, out loud laugh, one that I haven’t heard in so long, and one that makes my butterflies soar. “Oh I see how it is, you only wanted me around for my baking.”
I laugh along with him, and we’re both smiling and laughing, and if the old couple looked over at us right now they’d think we were good friends, or maybe they’d even think we were a couple that was going to end up just like them.
But soon, Adam and I calm our laughing, and our eyes meet, and we both know the truth.
We’re not a couple, and we’re not going to end up like them. And now it’s time for goodbye.
We both stand up, and I have to tilt my head back a little to keep looking at his eyes. I’d forgotten how much taller than me he was.
Without saying anything, we both fold ourselves into each other’s arms, my head fitting into the crook of his neck, one of his hands on my lower back, the other on the back of my neck. I don’t know exactly how long we stand there, just holding onto each other, my butterflies quiet and still for the first time in forever. I tell myself to remember what this feels like, and I lock it into my memories, where it will stay with all my other Adam memories, more than I could ever count.
Finally, we both pull away. Before he can get too far though, I lean forward and press my lips against his cheek.
He smiles at me, a smile full of bittersweetness, and he gently kisses my forehead before stepping completely out of my arms.
“I’ll see you around, Emery.” He says, and I know it’s the last time I’ll ever hear him say my name like that, like it’s his favorite word and the most important one he’ll ever say. While I hate the idea of him one day saying another name like that, I’m happy for it too.
“Goodbye, Adam.”
And then he turns around, and walks outside into the cold and snowy streets of Chicago, and he doesn’t look back.
It’s quiet and cozy in the bakery now. My hot chocolate feels like ice against my lips, and I stand up to throw it away. The trash can is near the table the older couple is sitting at, and as I walk past them, they both look up and smile at me, their hands still locked together on the table.
“Have a good day, sweetheart.” The woman says, and I smile and nod my thanks at them before making my way to the door.
I feel the cold air as soon as I crack it open, and I almost change my mind about leaving so soon. But I know I have to get out of here. I have to leave the last place I saw Adam - the last place I’ll ever see him - and begin to move on.
I glance back over my shoulder one last time, and see the couple exactly as they were when I first walked in: holding hands across the table, sharing a newspaper, content with the silence they’re sitting in. Because it’s their silence, just the two of them, and even when me and Adam were there, they still only had eyes and ears for each other. The woman smiles up at the man, and he leans close to her, pressing his lips against her forehead.
I turn away then, and start walking down the street, feeling lighter than I did when I first arrived at the bakery.
But something is still the same.
I have butterflies in my stomach.
They’re not the bad butterflies though. My flesh-eating butterflies are gone, having left at the same time Adam did. My butterflies are new, with soft wings of every color, that brush up against my chest and make it feel lighter. They’re flying around my heart, rebuilding and protecting. These butterflies are the ones I had when I first met Adam, when I first fell in love.
And these butterflies will be ready one day to fall in love all over again.