to a girl I've known my whole life
Let’s be clear: this is not a love letter. Because I'm not in love with you. At least, not anymore.
One time in high school, you told me how you adored handwritten letters, their realness and rawness, so the next day I scribbled all my thoughts and feelings and dreams onto a sheet of paper I never sent you. I guess it was too raw and real and I was embarrassed. But that wasn't a love letter either, because I wasn't in love with you then. Not yet.
No, it happened much later — at the end of undergrad, when I visited you at your college in the city of (brotherly) love.
I was only in town for an interview but came a day early to spend it with you. You met me in the lobby of your apartment building, eyes puffy, apologizing for being a mess — you'd just broken up with your boyfriend of four years.
"No matter,” I said, with a hug. You were obviously sensitive so I resolved to be careful with you.
Up in your apartment, we eased into light conversation, feeling out the familiar rhythms of an old friendship. We chatted about school, and friends of friends, and plans for the future. You gave me a jacket (your dad’s?) to try on and told me it looked good on me. Glowing internally, I wore it for the day.
Then you took me to see your city.
It was the first day of spring and the gentle afternoon sun melted away any remaining tension. You brought me to a nearby park on the roof of an eleven-story parking garage, where we looked out over the skyline and lay in the grass and listened to Mac Miller.
It had been years since we'd last talked, and I caught you up on the girls I had dated and my ongoing struggle with vulnerability and commitment. And you told me about your ex, how you'd never really learned to enjoy sex with him, and how nervous you were about performing sexually with someone new.
"Right, like what if you choked on it?" I affirmed, and you shot me a glare, offended at the implied incompetence.
"What? No. I mean getting to know someone else’s sexual habits after only dating one person for so long."
"Right. That's what I meant."
You took me to the stores on South Street, where we browsed a sex store and you dared me to buy a small vagina-shaped souvenir but I chickened out. We walked along brick-lined streets to an outdoor ice rink where we skated in circles, speaking very little as the sun set over the Delaware. I was lost in thoughts of life direction and upcoming interviews and you told me later that I seemed distant, as if in another world.
After dark, we got ramen and drinks with your friends, who were intrigued but wary of me and whispered words of caution into your ear. Then we went back to your place.
We lay side by side on your bed, sipping white wine, playing chess on my phone and passing it back and forth. And we talked.
We talked about fear. I told you how unsure I was about the future and how scared I was to still feel so lost. And you told me how scared you were about your mom’s cancer and how terrible you felt not being home to care for her. And you knew I would understand because when my mom was diagnosed with cancer all those years before, you were the first person I told.
Then you leaned into me and we fell into each other and somehow you ended up on top of me, straddling my leg, your eyes piercing, burning, carefully scrutinizing my every move, and I felt the heat between your legs on mine, and you were drunk, and I was lonely, and your face was inches from mine and I... didn't kiss you.
Looking back, I don't regret it. I'm glad I didn't invade you in your moment of weakness and so preserved our trust.
But that night, I left in ruins. Back in my hotel room, I tossed and turned for hours in the dark, picturing you and your eyes and your body on mine and hating myself for my cowardice.
The next day, on less than two hours of sleep, I bombed my interview.
To me, you are the summer.
You are the river in our hometown where we floated downstream on paddle boards, dipping our fingers and toes into the water as bright blue dragonflies mated in the air around us.
You are the nights we cruised in my old hand-me-down Lexus, our friends in the backseat, when you stood up through the sunroof, arms spread wide like Emma Watson in The Perks of Being a Wallflower, wind rippling through your hair.
You’re the music we shared — Mac Miller and Jon Bellion and Claude Debussy. You’re Citizen Kane and John Steinbeck and a yellow heart on Snapchat. You are memories of a home that no longer exists.
I trace you back through my childhood.
The elementary school hallway where I first saw you passing by, holding your dad’s hand. I liked the shape of your face, but I didn’t know how to express it, so the next year, in fifth-grade math class, I called you stupid. Sorry about that.
The high school library where we first became friends, talking shit about a girl we both hated. I told you I had a crush on your friend (and I did, at the time). Your eyebrows were tinged green from the chlorine of the swimming pool.
The daily video calls that tethered me home when my mom got sick and I moved overseas. I eventually adjusted to my new life out there, and we stopped calling. But each summer I came home, and each summer you were here.
These memories run deep, like roots — I could not remove them without breaking the very foundation of who I am. So when the seed of romance landed, it found purchase in fertile soil and grew, strengthened, into a tangle, a monstrous behemoth of crushing emotion that could not be contained. It had to come out.
I had to tell you how I felt.
It would be the last time I ever saw you.
It was early summer, a few months after that night in your city, and we were both back home. You were only in town for a few days but came to see me. You showed up to my house after dark, dressed in a black tee and black shorts, a funeral on a cool summer night.
Walking up to my front door, you hesitated.
"We're not supposed to see each other," you remarked. We were in a global pandemic. Our sick moms, especially, were at risk.
"Want to go on a walk instead?" I offered.
"No, it's fine. I'll come in." You were reassured, I guess, by my willingness to concede.
We chatted, as usual, about school, and friends of friends, and plans for the future. We had both just graduated college. I had secured a seat in grad school after a torturous circuit of interviews, and you had landed a well-paying job in a big city. We had new lives ahead of us.
We conversed our way into my bedroom, and you sat on my bed, and I in my chair, and as our conversation waned, I finally had to confront the reason I’d invited you over, to reveal the turmoil that consumed me, to expose the extent of my emotions.
So I told you.
You were surprised.
"Since when?" you asked.
"Since that night I came to visit."
And you looked down and fell silent. And by the time you looked back up, I already knew your answer.
You told me that you were in repair. That you weren't in a place, emotionally, where you could consider my feelings. We were about to head to different cities and there would be no chance for any kind of romance to blossom. But despite all that —
"Can I kiss you?" I asked.
You thought for a moment then said, "No, you shouldn't."
I wasn't dissuaded.
"Is it cool if I try anyway?"
So I sat beside you on the bed and leaned in, but at the last second, you turned your face away. And we sat there for a while, side by side, processing the sudden change in our dynamic.
I asked you what you liked in a man. You named five traits — ambitious, nice, funny, thoughtful, caring.
"What the hell?" I exclaimed, "I'm all of those." And you laughed.
You said you found me attractive and that if you didn't know me, you might have given me a chance. That made me feel a little better.
Then you asked if we could still be friends. I told you no. I said that I couldn’t handle being around you and not being with you. And if we’d stayed in touch, I could never move on.
And then there was nothing left to say.
I walked you out into the night and we meandered reluctantly towards your car, lingering, prolonging every step. And when we got there, we stood on the sidewalk under the stars and I hugged you long and hard, the way one hugs a best friend they’re about to lose forever.
Then you left. And the next day you drove away to your new city, to start your new life.
For months afterward, I saw phantoms of you. Sitting on my couch, on my bed. I dreamt of that final embrace, the feel of your body, the shape of your eyes. Even now, your presence lingers in my music, in my writing. I look for your eyes in every woman I meet.
By the time I moved to New York City, you had already left. Gone off on a new adventure overseas. But last week, I met a few of your friends from college, and they told me that you were doing well, that you seemed happy, and that you had a new boyfriend. I wondered if you'd learned to enjoy sex with him. I wondered if you ever missed me.
But I mean it when I say I'm no longer in love with you. Before writing this letter, I hadn’t thought of you in a long, long time. Unwatered, a romance withers and a man moves on. Still, once you love someone, a part of you loves them forever.
So I’m not in love with you, but I do still love you, the way I love cool summer nights and the river in our hometown and the car we used to drive in.
I love you like an old friend, one I could never replace — one I miss dearly.
👻 what I’ve been up to:
It’s the first week of spring again. You know what that means — street ball season. Hit me up if you want to get cooked (I’m terrible).
I got my first haircut in 3 months in preparation for a new job, and then the class I was supposed to start teaching got cancelled. That’s what I get, trying to work for someone else. I look fly though.
Been taking a lot of walks. This is the only pic I took this week. Excited for springtime in the city.
i was SEATED the whole story
My chest hurts after reading. Thanks (?)