i still smell you in combinations of fresh laundry, your sister’s avon perfume, and second-hand smoke.  it brings me back to everything that i wish i could forget.  it makes me regret not saving your love letters, the things we made for each other, the half-dollar… i got rid of all those things after you broke my heart because missing you almost killed me.  i thought getting rid of them would help me move past it.  i just wanted to feel like i had a reason to be alive.

  it’s been almost 10 years that we’ve known each other, even though it feels so much shorter… and i wish we could’ve spent more time together.  we spent chunks of time not talking, and then getting back in touch, without missing a beat.  you were always my best friend, even when i wasn’t yours, even though you’d say i was.  but i never felt like you owed me a thing.  we used to say how it was amazing that we’d never fought about anything.  then there was that one time i put you down for wanting to be a teacher… i was young and angry at the world and i regret saying those things and feel differently now if it matters…

  anyway now you’ve moved about as far away from me as a person could move, to live with the love of your life, and i’m happy for you.  but i still miss you and i can’t let go.  my hand misses yours in the early spring rain and that’s not a fair memory to be left with.  you were my first true love, and my first true heart-break.  we were separated by a power beyond us, and i tried so hard to get back to you, and just when i started getting closer, i peered through the window and someone else was sitting in my seat…

  i don’t want to replace you the way you replaced me.  i still don’t, after all these years, but i’m trying to, anyway.  i just wish i could say these things and warn you.  it seems right to let you know that i will stop replying to your conversation starters soon.  every time we speak, i enjoy it, even if it’s small-talk (and i hate small-talk), but it only stokes the embers of what we used to be, and i can’t bring myself to be burned anymore.

  may peace and love follow you.  it was good to know you, moss.