You loved him.
You loved him when he made you laugh so hard tears sprang into your eyes. You loved him when he rendered you breathless by how easy it was to be yourself around him. You loved him when you woke up one morning and felt your heart beat in your chest. You loved him when he made you feel alive for the first time in what felt like forever.
You loved him when you locked gazes across the room, you loved him as the sky bled roses and golds behind you as you felt the warmth of his skin, you loved him until you couldn’t remember what came before him.
You loved him when you saw both childhood and a future reflected in his eyes. You loved him when he showed you the version of himself he kept hidden from the rest of the world. You loved him when you were in his arms and knew that you never wished to be anywhere else.
You loved him as he left.
And you have missed him since.
You miss him when you stand in a room full of people and feel emptier than you’ve ever been. You miss him when you laugh with your friends and wonder how you are not alone, you are not alone, but, my god, you are lonely. You miss him when you search for his face in the crowd, when you wonder if you will ever stop searching, when you don’t know if you want to stop. You miss him when you fear that you will never feel as full as you did when you were with him. You miss him when it hits you that losing him meant losing the person you were when you were with him.
For the girl who misses him so much it hurts:
This is for you.
I’m here with you. I know the ache in your bones. I know the vision in your head in which see him one last time, and maybe it’s a long embrace or a last kiss or maybe it’s the two of you in an unlit room, and you can see him better than ever before, and you shout at him—let me go, tell me this is over, destroy me so I cannot destroy myself. I know. Which is why I need to tell you that this loss and the paralyzing, all-consuming, seemingly infinite grief that comes with it—it isn’t weakness.
It isn’t weakness to miss him so much you feel like you cannot breathe. It isn’t weakness to lie in bed for days because the world is gray and terrifying and you’re not sure if you can face it without him. It isn’t weakness to find yourself where you were five years ago, having fallen for a glimmering smile and a self-made illusion, even though you swore to yourself then that you would never let anyone have the power to ruin you.
It isn’t weakness that you keep looking for his face everywhere you go, it isn’t weakness that you hold onto hope. It isn’t weakness to be the one who always falls first. To be the only one who falls. To be the only one who crashes when she hits the ground and left in pieces. It isn’t weakness. It isn’t weakness to love someone who doesn’t love you back.
For the girl who misses him so much it hurts:
I know it doesn’t feel like it, but your heart was beating long before he came around, and it will continue to beat after.
There is a part of you that stood in museums as a child and stared at paintings in awe, and was moved by music, and poetry, and cried when you saw your favorite movies for the first time. There is a part of you that sang along to the radio in the car with your friends after school. There is a part of you that sat in your living room with your family on a Sunday morning and laughed and felt innocence restored. There is still a part of you that was never touched by him, a part that cannot be taken away.
But for now you just have to go through the motions. Even though it takes everything in you to drag yourself out of bed and go to class and live. Even though it feels like betrayal in the most twisted way. Because every time you do it, it’ll get easier. And one of these days, it’s going to stop hurting. And the excitement that overwhelms you as soon as you wake up, the feeling of your heart being unable to contain itself, all the wonderful things that come with the sheer intoxication of infatuation will happen again. And it will be better. And it will be right.
For the girl who misses him so much it hurts:
You are going to be okay.
