I want to lay my head on your chest and just listen to you talk. It had been a long time since I’d been that intimate with anyone.
I miss hearing about your day. I miss the way your eyes would light up when you’d talk about something you’re really passionate about. I miss your eyes lighting up when you’d talk that way about me.
I miss the good morning texts and you being interested in every detail of my day and my thoughts and dreams and aspirations.
I miss the hope you gave me, the sense of peace and security and worth. I miss feeling like I might have years of getting to know you ahead of me.
I miss you thinking I’m wonderful, and giving me the desire to surpass even your high expectations of that. God, I was already thinking of all these ways to surprise you, make your life a little easier, make you smile even when you’re having a bad day.
That last text you didn’t answer, about what your favorite kind of cookie is? I was asking because I wanted the time to figure out a gluten-free workaround for you and then bake you a batch when I came down to Houston like you requested that night you broke down on the phone…but then, of course, you never gave me a day to come down, then said the day was TBD…and then finally said, “Not this week,” and that we aren’t together and you didn’t know any of this even required a conversation. Just two days prior, you were calling me “baby” and telling me how amazing I am and talking about us figuring things out as we grow together.
I miss all our hypothetical planning of our future.
I miss when it felt like you really, truly meant it when you called me “Love.”
I miss being happy. No, not happy: giddy. The crazy-goofy happy we used to be that tipped off even people who didn’t know us well.
I miss seeing your name on my phone when you texted, called, FaceTimed me…and I miss that little jolt of excitement and comfort that ran through me every time.
If I don’t get a chance to do this over, if we don’t, it will be one of the biggest regrets of my life thus far.
When you drove up to take me out, I was so afraid of losing you. That’s why I was so guarded, stiff even. I could hardly believe you were real. Typically, men don’t make me nervous. I’m usually not the one who fucks things up either, for the record, especially not with someone I genuinely care about. I guess there’s a first time for everything though.
Not speaking to you is so much more difficult than I let on. The night after my team competed, when I went out with my best friend and left your Snap unread until the next day, it wasn’t because I wasn’t dying to hear what you had to say.
If I weren’t so afraid it would derail the fragile progress toward seeing each other/speaking again, I would tell you all these things and vow to do better next time…and every time after that. You asked last night about making a trip to Dallas soon…I hope you were serious about that. And I hope the text I sent you tonight doesn’t go unanswered, but I guess that remains to be seen.
I’m wondering if I should decide to see other people after all. I mean, clearly you are. I’ve been turning men down literally every single day because they aren’t you. But maybe that’s not the best way to go about this… Maybe I need to quit showing loyalty toward those to whom it isn’t due. God, I just really thought we were done searching.
I’m dying to see your face, hear your voice, curl up close to you, and just laugh the way we used to. But I won’t tell you any of that at this point. We’ll just have to wait and see if I ever get that chance.