The One Who Got Away
But that's the thing about life, right? It doesn't care about your plans. It doesn't stop to ask if you're ready or if you need more time. It just moves forward, dragging you along, leaving you scrambling to catch up. And now here I am, stuck in this awkward space between letting go and holding on, knowing that no matter how much I try to convince myself otherwise, it won't be me walking next to you. It's a cruel irony—knowing what you want, seeing it so close, but watching from a distance as someone else gets to live it.
And I guess, deep down, I knew. I knew that it wasn't going to happen. But there was always this tiny sliver of hope, a stubborn part of me that believed it could. That maybe, just maybe, you'd wake up one day and realize that I was right there, ready and willing. But that day never came, and now I'm left with nothing but these thoughts I can't shake. It's annoying, really, because how do you stop feeling something so strong? How do you let go of someone who feels like a part of you, even though you never really had them?
I want to be happy for you, I really do. I want to be the person who can smile and mean it when I say, "I'm glad you found someone who makes you happy." But I'm not there yet. I'm still tangled up in the 'what ifs' and 'could have been,' still hoping for a reality I know will never exist.
And the hardest part is knowing that, at the end of the day, you won't even know. You won't ever fully understand what you meant to me or how much it hurts to see you with him. Because I never told you. And it's my fault; it's on me. I don't blame you—I can't. Maybe I was scared; maybe I was just waiting for the "perfect moment" instead of allowing our perfect moment to happen.
Either way, it doesn't matter, and as much as I wish I could rewrite the ending, I'm not the writer this time.
And that's the hardest part—because, as a writer, I know how to create these stories and build worlds that don't exist. I get to choose who's happy, who gets hurt, who falls in love, and who loses. I can put together words to form the most beautiful images. I've really mastered that—except for this story. Our story.
I envision a million different ways it could have gone—a world where I was the one who renewed your faith in love, eased your hardest days, and brought sunshine to your cloudy skies. I was supposed to be the one who made you smile every day—the one who made you forget everything you'd been through. But those are just drafts of a story never meant to be told.
I thought I could pen my way out of this heartache, and if I wrote about it, it would make sense somehow. But this time, I'm just a character, an afterthought within the margins...
I really just said a bunch of words to say that I am truly happy for you; it's just that I wish it were me.
