The other day I was daydreaming about picking you up on the way to the grocery store. I only had to pick up a few things for dinner that night, but you taught me that it’s nice not to grocery shop alone.

It’s been a few months since we went our separate ways.

It’s hard to realize how toxic a relationship is while you’re still enveloped in it. Enveloped in the warm, always-OK-because-I-have-you mindset. Enveloped in the history, and the love, and the trust. But you know that it’s that last part that disappeared first.

I want you to finally understand the implications of what you did, and to whom you did it. I want you to understand that I think about you every single day and that when I hear your name, I flinch. I want you to understand that when I see you, I feel sick to my stomach and can't breathe. I want you to understand that being betrayed is like being repeatedly slugged in the heart with a wooden bat swung by someone much bigger, and much stronger than you.

But mostly, I want you to understand that I wouldn't have felt so ruined if it had been anyone else.

You know that I loved you. I think that you might’ve even known that I loved you more than anyone else. I think you knew that some days I might’ve even thought that I loved you more than myself. Unfortunately, I think that you took all of the things that you knew, or might’ve known, and put them in the palm of your hand, and did whatever the hell you wanted to with that knowledge. You were the best friend I’d ever held onto, an external extension of myself, and you took every advantage of that.

I don't even feel that terribly violated. Maybe I should, but whatever. No, it wasn't the action that hurt me. It was the ripping of trust out of my hands by the same person who had chained it there and promised time and time again to protect it, and to protect me. It was the realization that the person I hid behind at my worst moments; the one who was somehow always there to save me, was the same one hurting me. Who should protect you from the person that's is there to do the protecting? Granted, I probably put too much faith in you, and I probably should have done my own protecting. Lord knows that I do now.

I used to think things like, “he didn't mean to,” “he didn't know what he was doing,” “he was just being a dumb kid.” But no, you knew exactly what you were doing. You just thought that you wouldn't get caught. You thought that, like always, everything would turn up in your favor, and well, for a while it did!

It was too hard for me to live here without you, so I did the “right” thing and forgave you like I was told, and pretended like nothing had happened, that when you touched me I didn't feel like crying, and that when you were sitting in my car, I didn’t wish you’d get out as soon as you got in. I don't really know why I tried so very relentlessly to act like everything was normal, but everything wasn't normal. It wasn't OK. You have to understand that this wasn't OK.

That I am not OK.

I blocked your number and unfollowed you on social media. I went as far as to unfollow the people that interact with you frequently on social media. I even deleted your mom’s number! After trying so frantically and delusionally to cut you out of my world, I don’t even feel a little bit better.

This isn’t some kind of overly dramatic tell-all to make you feel like crap, quite the contrary. Because the real tragedy here is that I still love you. The real tragedy is that I don't cry now because of what you did or how everything went down. I cry because I miss you. I miss my best friend, and it kills me that the boy who knew everything about me isn’t there for me anymore. It kills me that when I think about who I love, you're still somewhere on that list, and it kills me that I can’t be there for you.

I promised you that I wouldn’t tell, and to be honest, I have told a few people. That’s on me. I thought I deserved some support, and, to be frank, I needed it. But I will never betray your trust the way you betrayed mine. I promise that I will never forget you, and I will never stop being inspired by what happened between us. I miss you, but we’re done here. You’ve taught me all you can about trust.

And even a little bit about grocery shopping.