What’s the Hardest Part of Long-Distance?
Not the missing. You can get used to missing. Not the FaceTime either — at least you can see each other’s faces.
The hardest part is: that empty feeling right before sleep — knowing they’re not there.
Jess in New York, me in LA. 3,000 miles, three hours apart. Every night when she’s ready for bed, I’m still at work. By the time I get home, she’s asleep.
We leave each other voice messages saying goodnight. But voice messages don’t hold you.
An Excuse, Not a Gift
Last Christmas, I sent her a Highlight Time. Not as a gift — as an excuse. I left a note in the box: “Heard the app can sync. Wanna try it? Think of it as an experiment.”
She texted me after she got it: “You sent me a toy?”
I replied: “I sent you a way to sleep together.”
The First Night
- That app has a feature called “Sleep Sync.” You put it by your pillow, and it vibrates gently with your breathing rhythm.
- If two people have it on at the same time, it sends one person’s breathing rhythm to the other’s device.
- I lay in bed in LA, phone beside me. Opened the app, saw Jess was online.
- The little thing started vibrating. Not a fixed rhythm. One pulse. Another. Another. Like a heartbeat. Like breathing. Like someone shifting beside you in bed.
- I looked at the app: it said “Receiving Jess’s breath.”
Breathing Each Other’s Breath
The Morning After
Next morning, I got her message: “Last night I dreamt you were beside me. When I woke up, you weren’t there — but that thing was still vibrating. I stared for a few seconds before realizing — that was your breath from last night.”
I replied: “Let’s sleep together like this every night.”
Every Night Since
Now, every night before bed, we turn it on. Sometimes she’s working late, I’m watching a show — we do our own thing. But as long as that little thing is vibrating, I know: she’s there too.
3,000 miles, three hours apart. But we fall asleep breathing each other’s breath.
My Highlight Time: not being together, but feeling you even when we’re apart.
