Dear you,

Hi. it’s that time again. why is it that thoughts of you linger in my mind when the late hours roll in? is it because i’m alone? I don’t know why i’m here. Or why i’m bothering. I hope by the end of this letter, I find out why. Lets start off with how are you. You okay? It’s certainly been a while. I hardly know what goes on with you anymore. why is it i feel an ache in my heart every time i remember I used to know what you were doing. I used to know everything about you. You were my best friend. Now you’re only a memory fading in my brain. A memory of a boy I used to know.

On nights like this I wish I had never met you. I wish my heart didn’t jump at the thought of seeing you. I wish it didn’t ting every time I hear your name. Your name, it confuses me. The mention of it either lights me up or leaves me aching for days. It’s almost forbidden in my house. I laugh at the thought of this. You’re presence in my life is something me and my mother pretend never existed. For the sake of her’s and my sanity. Her’s so she doesn’t have to remember the time she lost control of me. Mine so I can stop acting like I don’t want to fall to my knees crying every time you were mentioned. Instead we pretend like you were never here. The memories we had are blurring in my mind. But the one that sticks is the way you touched me.

Every placement of your hand on my skin left an imprint on me, like a burn. It left me itching for you. Every hug is imprinted into my head, i swear sometimes i can still feel you there. It’s like I’ve memorized how it felt for your arms to be around my neck. Oh but how i long for that again, in the flesh. Not only limited to my thoughts. On nights like this I realize how much I still miss you. I miss you. I miss all the late calls, all the laughter, all the jokes, all the small arguments. I miss us, before it got complicated.

I had never felt the way I did when i met you. what we had was not allowed. It was not until you that I realized, I could care so deeply about a person, to the point that I would nearly give up everything I had known just to experience loving them. despite all odds being against us, I loved you anyways. I loved the way you loved me. Reminding me of my worth, teaching me how i should be treated constantly. Everyday i woke up knowing you were only a call away was a day I spent content, fulfilled and happy. It was surreal being in love with you. But i suppose all good things come to an end, i suppose this was our karma.

The day I realized I had to leave you was the hardest day of my life. Every second of that day I spent dreading what was to come. I had a million things to say to you. So many thoughts. Every word i said to you felt like a knife to my heart. It hurt me to give you up. I had to remind myself that this was for you. This was a decision I wanted to make, not a decision I wanted to be forced for me to make. I wanted this to end properly. This was for you. I did what I did for the sake of your future happiness. To help you avoid any prolonged pain. The faster we ended, the faster you would move on and forget. I lost count of how many times I wanted to retract everything i said that night, how many times I wanted to give in to your pleads and just forget that it had ever happened, pretend like we could get through it. I loved you. I do love you. You deserve the world. You deserve someone who can be with you. who can actually be there for you when you need them. You deserve someone better. Not someone who has to hide you. I was so proud of you. Everything you achieved during our time. I wanted to brag, but I couldn’t. We just weren’t realistic. But I wanted us to be. I really did want to believe we could work and be happy. But I couldn’t lie to you, never mind myself.

Now I am faced with you moving on. This is what I wanted right? This is what i asked for. We used to talk even after our end, constantly using each other as a reminder that we’d be okay. I think we both secretly hoped we’d give up on our end and just be together again. I couldn’t let that happen. After a few months our daily catch-ups lessened to once or twice a month. Sometimes I forget about you, even for a few seconds. Then you come back to me in waves, flooding every part of me with the pain that comes with remembering you. All I wanted to do was cry. Scream. Hurt. Mope. Lock myself in my room and wallow. I haven’t cried once since we ended. I haven’t cried about us. Its funny, it’s like my brain wont let me. I physically cant. Instead there’s been a heavy weight in my heart, it just wont go away. I visited the town you lived in a few weeks back. It took all of me to not crumble, to not show any emotion. I did not realize how overwhelmed i’d be in a place we’d spent so little time in. You weren’t even in the country at the time, I knew you weren’t there. But I still looked out for your face in the crowds. I do this all the time. I don’t know why. Because even if I did spot you, there is no way I could speak to you. I’d just have to walk away, and pretend I never knew you. Pretend like your presence so close to me doesn’t sting me.

I hope you’re happy. Genuinely, I hope eventually you find a new love.A new girl who will be ready to pour her heart and soul into loving you, just like I did. I hope the next time I read this or look back at this, I’m happy. I hope it doesn’t hurt to hear your name anymore. I wish for myself to have moved on. Thank you for being such a big part of my learning. Thank you for teaching me what love is at such a young age. I love you & I hope you’re doing well.

someone you used to know