"heartbreaker" that was the nickname we teased each other with. Me for you and you back at me. Even though it was always supposed to be in relation to other people, it also felt like on some level we knew that it was a prediction of our inevitable truth.
It's easy to look back now, a decade later, at all of our old texts (the photos long lost to time, upgraded phones, fleeting hurt, and jealous ex's) and see that it was obvious we were interested in each other. It's also easy to say that I shouldn't have been given my situation but you also should have given me a clear sign. Because the truth that I've always known is, I would have left him for you. In a heartbeat. In a breath. In a glance. But I didn't have confirmation from you and you, I'm guessing, weren't sure that I would leave if you asked. And so you didn't. And we never became more than the brief moments of what could have been.
We were young and I know there's no point in wishing for something that didn't happen. But I do wish it. Just to see what we could have been. Just to know what it would have been like openly and without the excuses to message each other or hiding behind the things we joked about as if comedy and dumb teasing could somehow mask our real feelings. I don't know if we would have lasted but I think we would have been good together. I know we would have been good together. But we were two kids who didn't expect to fall for each other in the middle of an inconvenient time. So we texted all day at work, and all day when we weren't on the same show, and late into the night, and on weekends, and before cousin's wedding, and when you were out with people wishing you were with me instead. We snapped each other so often that my family knew your face better than my boyfriend's. I really should have left him for you. I was going to -- it's a dumb excuse but again, I was young and I was guilted into staying because he knew that I was already becoming yours instead. And rather than letting me go, he held on tighter in the hopes that even if I didn't love him at least I wouldn't be allowed to love you. And it worked.
I wish I'd been more selfish then. Because I was happiest whenever you looked at me with those bright sparkling blue eyes and that charming boyish smile. I was smitten whenever you'd set up the garden and gazebo for our lunch breaks. I saw a glimpse of our future when you took me to that open house, put your arm around me, and absolutely glowed when you told the agent that I was your fiancée (the worst ruse I've ever had but the best one I've ever been a part of). But the moment that I think I really fell for you and was ready to break up with him was that day you asked me to cut your hair. An innocuous little ask that changed everything. You knew I didn't know what I was doing, that I didn't have anything but my craft scissors, that it was the dumbest ask for a guy who knew his looks were how he got a lot f what he wanted in life -- and none of that mattered to you. Because all you cared about, hair be damned, was that for however long we were going to be doing this that you had my undivided attention and that we were going to be alone together. What I didn't expect was for how intimate it felt to be inches from your face, staring into your eyes as you held my gaze never blinking. The feeling in my stomach as all of the butterflies danced around as your joking eyes softened and you looked at me, I mean REALLY looked at me. You put on In The Lonely Hour and as my hands touched your hair, scared to cut all those golden tendrils, my fingers grazed the side of your face and I remember feeling warm sparks.
I think I loved you in that moment. Just a little. It's only now, 10 years in the future, that I look back on that July 6th and remember that we were texting in the night/early morning before that day. You were trying to get me to open up and so I'd admitted:
"I'm thinking about the paths we take and what if you picked the other option, how much different would things be now ... I just met someone the same time I met my boyfriend and I'm wondering what would have happened or if anything would have happened on the other path"
I'd conceded a lot in that moment and your response didn't really give me anything back. But still, we met up that afternoon and that's when I think your response was to tell me everything you were feeling through the music of someone else. But it wasn't clear to me and while I was certain of what I'd felt, that uncertainty and the guilt from him wasn't enough to let me end it with him and run right into your arms.
I don't want you to leave, will you hold my hand.
You texted me that line the first day at work after that day. It didn't feel like a lot at the time but I know now that it was all you were capable of then. I wish we had both been a little braver and a little bolder. Because even though we no longer talk and it 's been years since we've seen each other, here I am writing about the time in my life when I loved a boy I wasn't supposed to. It's nice to pull out and dust off those memories of you and remember exactly how it felt to stare into your eyes that summer day and feel in that moment, the kind of love that inspires albums of the same magnitude.
