Almost 6 months of laughing, joking, jamming, car riding, and memories washed away with one phone call and yet if I could speak to you again all I would say is “thank you.” Thank you for being the first person to show me what love felt like and what butterflies really meant. Thank you for picking me up when I was at my lowest and showing me the rainbows after the storm and thank you for breaking me to a point, I wasn’t sure I’d ever return.
I can’t remember a day that went by that I wasn’t on edge, walking over a puddle of eggshells around you or compromising what I wanted in return for your happiness. My brain morphed around the good times: the days you would drive over 5 hours to come see me because I was having a bad day, the times you’d call my grandparents to talk to them about how much you loved me, or the several moments we found ourselves locking eyes and just smiling because of how in love we were.
I wanted to frame us there, right where we started, as two people who genuinely just loved each other. “Friends first and friends always,” we would remind each other every day, to acknowledge the relationship that started the romance. We’d treat each other like nothing more than strangers who happened to be dating.
You hold a piece of me in your heart whether you keep it there or give it away, it is yours to keep and a memory to treasure. I was recently asked “Why did you stay with her for so long” and my instant response was “because I loved her” to which was followed by “was it love? Or was it need? You depended on her and you felt like you needed her, so you stuck around. But love shouldn’t feel like that” and I have been frozen ever since, trying to wonder how someone could say that but yet learning that its true.
I am only a sophomore in college and it’s my second semester at The University of Scranton, there will be so many opportunities for me to learn, to live, and to love. Love that doesn’t feel suffocating or aching. Love that doesn’t come with a caution sign or a warning label. Love that doesn’t carry any extra baggage or conditions. A love that feels like the produce isle at the grocery store, or a walk in the park on a sunny day.
This relationship was the best I’ve ever had but it doesn’t mean it was the best I’ll ever have. While my heart is still full of care and love for my ex, I miss the person I fell in love with, my best friend not who they have become to me now. I wish them all the best, while I wish they could’ve been the best.
In the future I truly do hope I don’t ever settle for less than what I know I deserve, and I hope this is used as a love letter and a promise to myself. I am worthy of the love I give to everyone else, and I hope I realize that one day. I owe it to myself to be there for her, she’s been through hell and back with me especially after this breakup, she deserves that care too. She treats me well, she feeds me, and she hugs me when I’m sad.
I owe her the world, and I am her. I hope this heartbroken girl inside of me one day realizes that she is setting the world on fire and no one should ever put that out.