I was young and damaged, you could take one look at me and notice; but, you didn’t care. Instead of running away after knowing all of the baggage that came with a girl like me, you stayed — and more importantly, you taught me how to love.

I remember our first real date. I laid my head on your shoulder at the movies and somehow felt safer. I was captivated by you, only had eyes for you, and I wanted to fall in love with you. I’m so happy I did.

I didn’t fall in love with you all at once, it started with your patience. It took me months to actually accept a compliment from you, to say, “thank you” when you called me beautiful instead of getting embarrassed and blushing while saying, “stop.” I always knew you meant it, but you knew many people who had called me beautiful in the past had hurt me. You never pressured me to let you in, you knew I’d do it on my own.

When I told you about the skeletons in my closet and the ugly truths about my past, you promised me you’d always protect me, and that the past wouldn’t define how you felt about me. You stayed true to your word, and that was the grace in you that I fell in love with.

Trust me, I know loving me wasn’t easy. I have a personality strong enough for three people and an attitude as ardent as a fire. But you put up with it, and it showed me that if someone finds you worth his or her time they’d stick around no matter what. You did that. Despite whatever arguments we got into, you always wanted things to be better than before, and with that I fell in love with your persistence.

I remember the first time you told me you loved me, I almost didn’t believe it. No one other than my family had said those three words in such a meaningful way, but when you said it, something inside me changed. My world flipped upside down; black and white turned into color, rain into a cloudless sky, and I finally knew what love was. It was you, and it was me.

You taught me that it is possible to fall in love with the rhythm of someone’s breathing as they sleep, that the touch of another person can feel electric, and that it is possible to cry from being so incredibly happy.

They say falling in love is like the rain. You can’t predict it, but you can always see signs of it before it completely falls. I felt myself falling in love with you and I didn’t stop it from happening, I knew it was right. In the future, no matter how many times I fall in love, I’ll always look back and think of you.

I had always hoped that the first time I fell in love it would be at first sight, but I’m happy to have gradually fallen in love with you. Thank you, for not only loving me but for teaching me how to love back.