Before I met you “love” was just a word to me. A word filled with false hope and lies. I was never the little girl that prayed every night for her perfect prince to come along. Even at a young age I knew better than to believe that there was such a thing as a “perfect” prince. In middle school, I gagged over the romantic movies that my friends were constantly obsessing over because I knew that I didn’t need anyone but myself and that a love like those in the movies just didn’t exist. In high school, I began to convince myself that I didn’t need anyone but myself and my family. And then you happened.
Somewhere in between the chaos that’s called my life, fate brought me to you. I fell in love with the fact that you were far, far, from perfect yet in my eyes you came pretty **** near close. There was something about your flaws that fit so perfectly with mine and I fell in love with all the things that you hated about yourself. And just like that, my opinion of love and how I should live my life changed.
This is the part of the letter where I pour my heart out and try to explain how I feel and what your love means to me. I keep finding myself writing a few words and then deleting them over and over again. I now realize that love simply cannot be explained. It’s so much more complex than that. But then again what in life isn’t more complex than what we think. Hell, even the smartest group of chemists and philosophers cannot explain what I feel. I can sit here and try, yet I would never be able to accurately describe the butterflies I get when I’m with you or how time seems to slow when you’re not. How my heart races at the mention of your name or the way I hate to say I love you when I know you don’t love me the same.
Back then love used to be such a blurry concept, and now it’s the only thing in this crazy world that makes since. You make me crave something that I didn’t believe actually existed. And suddenly every song was about you. I couldn’t escape the through of you no matter where I went. I heard you in the wind, on the radio, in the rustling of the leaves, and in between the gasps of my breath. Honestly you’re still not a perfect man or a prince, but your something better than that; you’re real. Perfectly imperfect in all the right ways. So thank you for changing my views on the world, for understanding my flaws, and for being the only person who can send me to new levels of utter happiness.
When I speak to my future daughter about the one that got away I’ll immediately think of you. You are the man I will be talking about when I am 80 years old. They boy with stars for eyes and the devilish smile. She will ask me why I never married you and I will tell her that I never had the courage to admit my feelings for you because I was afraid that in your eyes I was just your kid sister. I will tell her no one has ever intimidated me as much as you did and that the more I fell for you the more steps backwards I took. Till eventually I had lost you. You are the man I will tell her about when I encourage her to go all out for her love and tell the boy she loves how she feels before it’s too late. To wear her heart on her sleeve because life is too short to be scared of her feelings. You are the man who has always been everything I ever wanted and needed when I did not know what I needed. You are the man I will forever carry in my heart and soul.
But I don’t want to always be wondering “what if…” 10 years down the road. All I know is I am here and this is now and I’d rather give it a shot and tell you my heart now than to sit and think wistfully about this moment when I am 80 years old like I stated above. So finally after five crazy years here it is, I love you, and I think a part of me always will.
The song Not In That Way by Sam Smith explains what I cannot.
Thank you for being my friend, my person to turn to, my first love. I am leaving but I couldn’t leave without finally getting it all out there. Now I can finally be free and live my life.