Chapter 40: Yaron

I did it. I became a clinical psychologist in six and a half years.

It hadn’t been an easy road. I took the maximum number of credits possible. I never flunked anything. And I managed to do this with a fairly normal college experience. It took some careful planning and some sacrifices, but I did it.

I was truly proud of myself.

But as I sat with my degree in hand, the weight of another decision pressed heavily on my shoulders.

My family kept pushing me to join them every Saturday at the synagogue, find a good Jewish girl, to get married and give them lots of grandchildren.

Telling my family that I wasn’t following the Jewish faith anymore had been looming in the back of my mind for years. Even though my accomplishments were undeniable, there was something about leaving behind the traditions they’d raised me in that felt like a betrayal. A new betrayal after I refused to follow my father’s steps.

They’d tried to instill those beliefs in me since I was a child. They had talked about the importance of family, tradition, and faith as though they were the building blocks of life.

I was about to dismantle all of that, at least in their eyes. I didn’t think religion should dictate my choices anymore, but they wouldn’t understand. I had seen the way my mother’s face would falter every time I skipped another holiday or dodged a religious ceremony. She always hoped I’d come back to it.

I steeled myself for the conversation, though I knew it wouldn’t be easy. They loved me, I knew that, but this ... this would be the hardest thing I’d ever said to them.

And then, there was Vee.

I used to turn to her when the world pulled me in too many directions. She had this way of grounding me, making me feel like whatever choices I made, it was okay to carve out my own path.

But Vee wasn’t there for me anymore, and I had promised myself I wouldn’t let her memory linger in the corners of my mind. After all, our relationship—whatever it had been—had ended years ago.

I missed her, though. Not the wild, shallow megastar she had become, but my friend. I missed the way she saw through my bravado, how she’d laugh and call me out on things no one else had the guts to say.

I never told her that she was the one who inspired me to follow my dream of becoming a psychologist. Without Vee, I would have ended up working at my father’s company.

The girl so many admired wasn’t my Vee, the strange girl who dreamed big. She had become Raven Black. Her hair had become fashionable, a style girls asked for at salons.

What did Raven Black represent? Excess. Addictions. Living recklessly. Power. Freedom. Dreams coming true. She embodied a rebellious youth who could have whatever they wanted—if they wanted it hard enough.

Her new film had been a success. I had only seen the first one. I never saw her new movies. What for? I wasn’t about to scratch at a wound that had begun to heal.

I read in a magazine that she was dating some guy—Colin something. She had moved on.

I had to move forward, too, even if it meant pushing her further from my thoughts.

Forgetting her wasn’t easy, when the rest of the world insisted on showing her to me. I saw her face on television, on YouTube, and on magazine covers.

But, I was determined to succeed.

The girl I had fallen in love with didn’t exist anymore. She had become Raven Black, a celebrity who filled movie theaters and sold magazines, but was worlds away from me.

Still, on quiet days, I could almost hear her voice, telling me she needed me, begging me not to give up on her.

I did my best to let her go. It was the only way I could move on. Holding on to her, even in fragments, would only make it harder.

I taught myself to meditate and became good at it. Every Sunday, I practiced Tai Chi in the park. I dated some girls and took some of them to my bed, but I wasn’t ready for a steady relationship.

Drop by drop, I let go of the sadness, the anger, the regrets, and the jealousy. In the end, all that remained were the good memories—ones I would never part with.

Vee became a childhood friend, someone who belonged to my past.

And then, one day, the longing for someone I had lost, turned into peace of mind.

All or nothing—that was how things worked with Vee. And, finally, I accepted that the latter was what we had left.

I was enjoying, for the first time, a life without Vee. One that, to be honest, wasn’t bad at all.

I discovered that I could be happy in many other ways. I loved being a psychologist, and I still carved wood as a hobby.