You Never Knew
You will never know how much I really liked you. No, you won’t. I’m sure of it. How could you, when I never told you? Not in the way I should have. Maybe I should have screamed it until my lungs gave out, forced you to listen, forced you to understand that somehow, impossibly, it had become all about you. That you had somehow taken up every quiet corner of my mind without even trying.
But I didn’t.
I couldn’t.
Because every time I gave you the slightest sign, you were already pulling away. Every time I let a little piece of what I felt slip through the cracks, you pushed it right back. And maybe that was my answer. Maybe I just refused to accept it for longer than I should have.
So I left.
Not because I stopped caring, but because I had to gather whatever little pieces of my dignity were still left and walk away with them. It hurt. God, it hurt more than I ever let you see. But there are some kinds of pain you learn to carry quietly when holding on begins to cost you your self-respect.
And still, sometimes, I wonder just how much of a lover girl I really was.
There was a time when I woke up thinking about you and went to sleep thinking about you. A time when the smallest things somehow found their way back to you. A time when you would enter the same room as me and my heart would jump against my ribs like it was trying to escape. My ears would burn. My hands would suddenly forget what they were supposed to be doing.
And whenever you stood close to me, I couldn't deny the warmth of your presence.
Then there were those accidental touches.
God, those touches.
A brush of fingers. A shoulder against mine. The smallest, most insignificant contact that probably meant nothing to you, yet somehow made my entire heart feel alive.
I remember that version of myself.
And strangely enough, I don't wish I could go back to her.
Because I couldn't survive your rejection again.
Not after already knowing what it felt like to reach for someone and feel them quietly move out of your grasp.
What I hate, though, is what came after.
Having to pretend that you're just someone I know.
Just a friend.
Just another person whose name doesn't make my heart pause for half a second.
I hate that I had to lock everything I felt inside a cage and throw away the key. I hate that I had to teach myself not to look for you in a crowded room, not to notice when you walked in, not to wonder if you noticed me too.
And sometimes, the worst thought of all creeps into my mind—
Maybe you knew.
Maybe you always knew.
Maybe you saw every little sign, understood every unspoken confession, and still chose to pretend you didn't.
I don't know which possibility hurts more.
But what can I do?
You can't force someone to choose you.
You can't make someone feel something just because you would have given them everything.
And maybe that's the hardest lesson of all, that sometimes, loving someone deeply still isn't enough to make them stay.
I really thought we were going to be endgame. I thought, somehow, after all the almosts and all the moments that felt like they could become something more, we'd eventually find our way to each other.
But we didn't.
And maybe that's okay.
Maybe some people are meant to be chapters rather than the whole story.
Whatever happened, happened for a reason.
At least, that's what I tell myself.
Because if I don't believe that, then I'd have to believe that I loved you for nothing.
And I'd rather believe that even a love that never became ours was still worth having.