An Open 'Thank You' (April 30th, 2013)
I miss you.
It kills me every time I pass you two in the hall. I pretend not to care, and I almost pretend that I don’t see you.
But I do.
I think about those days all the time – when it was us – and I’m starting to think that it’s pretty unhealthy to still not be over you, but I can’t help it. Even though you tore me up inside and I felt and still feel
BETRAYED.
I still remember how happy you made me and how I kind-of-but-didn’t-quite tell you that I loved you when we were falling apart. I miss your sisters and how much they seemed to like me. I miss how I couldn’t quite tell if your parents liked me or not and how hard I tried to make sure they did. I loved that one night you invited me to dinner with your family and I didn’t eat because I was so nervous; how you held my hand in your dad’s truck all the way there and we kept it our own secret. My mom was so pissed at me that night.
I remember all those times when I wanted to kiss you so badly but I just couldn’t because I was so worried that it wouldn’t be special – that it wouldn’t be perfect.
You know, I almost did one day after school. The snow was gently falling and we were walking outside after school. I slipped on some ice.
You caught me.
You were so handsome right then with little white flakes perched on your eyelashes and sprinkled through your hair. So handsome in fact, that I couldn’t stop staring, and in that brief moment, I had the sudden and crushing realization that I was unworthy and so undeserving of someone like you. You walked beside me, caught me as I fell, and you weren’t afraid of holding me close. I looked deep into your shining eyes and almost lifted my lips to yours, but you pulled me to my feet too soon. My chance, the one and only time I thought that there was the possibility of perfection, slipped away, and suddenly I was all too aware of the frigid wind whispering between us.
I was undeserving.
I was undeserving of you and your empathetic and humorous demeanor, your beaming smile, your shining and tender eyes. I was undeserving of your attention, your compassion, and your comforting and strong embrace. I wasn’t worthy of your intelligence, your caring comments, or the way you always seemed to make time to talk with me. You know I changed my phone plan… 2,000 texts a month for those two short months. I had never sent that many text messages in one month… Never.
Yet, I was undeserving in another way.
I didn’t deserve crying myself to sleep every night for two weeks and every other night for the next two months. I had given you so much that I had never given anybody else, and you took it without ever asking me how I felt about it. Did I feel lonely? Did I feel vulnerable? Did I feel naïve, stupid, or used?
In case you were curious, I did at the end.
I was so undeserving of that sudden abandonment. It was almost as if I didn’t serve whatever your purpose was anymore. I didn’t do what you wanted me to do, I didn’t say what you wanted me to say, I didn’t act how you wanted me to act, but I didn’t know any better. I’ve wondered in the days since then what would have happened if you would have talked to me about it. Sure, I thought it was all you, but maybe you thought it was all me. I guess I’ll never know.
It’s possible that things could have been different, but I’m reminded every time I see your hand in hers, your lips on hers, your arms wrapped around her that things aren’t different. This is the way things are now and I’m just going to have to learn to live with it. It’s not the first time I’ll be rejected and it’s surely not the last, but I guess it’s true when they say you’ll always have a spot in your heart for your first love.
You’ve taught me a lot of lessons, and for that, I thank you.