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[ourloveunspoken]

Unspoken Heartache

Unspoken Heartache

Unrequited Love — I know this all too well. Loving someone that does not love you back in the same way. This is common in friendships where one person develops feelings for the other one. In my case, it was my best friend, I liked her but the feeling was not returned.

I met her in my final years of middle school and we've been best friends ever since. Our friendship grew in a flash. It was supposed to be purely platonic, until one day I realized my heart had crossed a line. In my 2nd year of high school, I started to care about her more than a best friend would. I cared so much about her that jealousy started creeping in. I kept pushing that feeling aside, pretending it wasn't there. However, in summer I realized that I can’t push this feeling aside, because I liked her and I could not deny it. In the second month of school I confessed to her I told her what I felt, she rejected me but she still made me feel loved, cared, and reassured me that this won’t ruin our friendship.

My relationship with her was different from all my other friendships. It was full of playful jokes and exaggerated displays of affection — I pushed our friendship into silly extremes. It reminded me of the story “Litany”, the poem uses humor and exaggeration to express love without idealizing it. That mirrors the way I interacted with her. We weren’t dramatic or romantic. We were just two best friends in our playful moments, carrying emotions I didn’t want to admit at that time. Just like in the poem, affection can be expressed in a playful, imperfect, human way and it can be meaningful without needing it to be perfect or dramatic. In my case, calling her my “bb”, teasing her, sharing jokes, and treating her something different were small acts of showing how much she mattered to me. When I finally admitted my feelings for her I got rejected, but it didn’t erase the value of our friendship or the affection I felt. 

Liking her was like a roller coaster of emotions—fear, sadness, happiness, and regret. Most of the time, my feelings brought me more fear and regrets than joy,  which reminded me of the story “On seeing the 100% perfect girl one beautiful April morning”. In that story, the man instantly falls for the perfect girl, but his fear of rejection prevents him from telling her how he deeply felt. This story reminded me of my experiences of fear. Even though I deeply cared for my best friend, I was scared of how confessing might change our friendship, so I tried to ignore it. I regretted having feelings for her, wishing I didn’t feel this way, fearing how this would affect the both of us, feeling unsure of telling her what I felt. I saw her as someone special, unique, and deeply important to me. Even if she couldn’t reciprocate, my feelings made her seem ideal in my eyes. I used to think it was just a matter of ‘right person, wrong time,’ but now I understand that there will never be a perfect time, because our feelings and orientation will never match. The only difference is that I confessed, even knowing my feelings might not be returned.

As my feelings progressed, my mind began creating its own possibilities, those constant ‘what if’ questions. Reflecting on these moments reminded me of a story “If you were a dinosaur, My Love”, which talks about the narrator imagining a chain of “what if” scenarios. The narrator uses fantasy to cope with a painful truth, I used “what if” scenarios to escape that my feelings might never return. "I told myself, 'what if she liked me too?' 'What if things were different?' 'What if we are meant to be but just not now?' 'What if I never really liked her?' 'what if I did not neglect her in the past, would things go differently?” These imaginations made it easier for me, I made myself realize to better cope with the pain I feel. I love her so much but I can’t change what she is, I can’t change her sexuality, and feelings. I created my own fantasies that maybe we can be more than friends, that she can reciprocate my feelings, and if my timing is not right we will be together in the future. These “what ifs” helped me cope. I longed for a version of reality, where things could work out, where love didn’t have to hurt. However, I faced reality, I confessed, I heard her answer, and I accepted it. This reminds me that not everything we can change, there are just things that are not meant to be, and if I can’t find love now maybe I'll find the one in the future.

Ultimately, these three stories taught me that life is full of regrets, fears, things we want to change, but we just need to live through it. If you love someone, you need to be prepared to go through all this because I knew what was coming for me but I decided to stay through it. I risked everything because I’d rather risk confessing than regret not confessing. This shows me that love takes time and you should not rush it. My story began with a friendship that grew but it ended on an inseparable friendship that can go through many challenges. In the end, I learned that love isn’t always getting the answer you hoped for. Sometimes it is about understanding yourself, and respecting yourself. Even though my feelings weren’t returned, I gained a friendship that can’t break even when tested. And maybe that’s the real lesson—love won’t always turn into romance, there are times when it's better as a platonic love. My story didn’t end with a love story, but with a love transformed into a friendship that I wouldn’t trade for anything.