i could never give you peace

no you don't get it. he broke up with his girlfriend right after he saw percy for the first time in twelve years. there was never anyone else for him and he knew it. he weight trained every day because he wanted to be strong enough to pull her out of the lake if something went wrong on her big lake-crossing swim, and he had nightmares weeks beforehand about something happening to her because he cared about her so much. he sat with her and helped her through her panic attack even after she'd just admitted to something extremely hurtful. he bought every horror movie he'd see for years so he just had a box of horror movies he couldn't watch without her. he asked her to make him a friendship bracelet in the same colours as hers the day they met. he loved her. he loved her so much, every step of the way, in small ways and big ways, in every little glance, in the choice to forgive her and be kind to her after what she'd done. he loved her, even knowing the truth. he told her, "the way I felt about you was always so clear to me—even when we were young I knew you and I were meant for each other. two halves of a whole. i loved you so much that the word ‘love’ didn’t seem big enough for how I felt."

Did you know that soda machines at restaurants and movie theaters spy on you? That most common new cars now record your sexual preferences and send it to the manufacturer (and also data about anyone who also gets in your car, walks by your car, and maybe happens to be within visual range of your car)? That grocery stores are trying to force customers to download an app to scan barcodes on shelves instead of putting up prices, so the app can scan the phone, decide how much that customer should be squeezed for, and adjust the price? That more and more innocent people are being sent to jail for crimes committed hundreds of miles away because an AI facial recognition algorithm spit their faces out and the cops didn't bother to do the most basic of checks?