You weren't going to come around and I knew it all along. From the start, everyone told me "he's not going to give you closure" but that's all they said.
I held out hope for two months. On the day where it all hit me so hard, the day where it seemed like everyone was running into you, I began to break down like the day you ended things. Out of nowhere, there you were, 45 minutes from our homes, smiling, catching up with me, asking me to sit. I was myself again.
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You told me you'd call me. You told me you wanted to talk. It has been over a month since we ran into each other and that has yet to happen.
I waited for that call. I even tried calling you. Nobody would tell me anything, and for some reason, I became more and more optimistic. "He's just busy - he's out of town this week" I would tell everyone. Which wasn't a lie, but the days you were home, I didn't hear from you.
It was when I realized that I couldn't keep feeling like this that I told myself I needed to make my own closure. The feeling of wishing, of feeling hopeless on the inside. The feeling of despair and need for dependency - it's all I felt. I never stopped wondering where you were, who you were with, how you were, everything. It's taken some time, but it's coming together. I said goodbye to you in my head.
I said goodbye when I realized I couldn't listen to some of my favorite songs anymore: the songs you sang on stage with me, in the car with me, the songs I found you humming to in the kitchen when getting me ice cream at 11:30 at night. I said goodbye when I donated the shirts that I have a certain memory with: the striped shirt from our first date, the crop top from our lazy days last summer - they're gone in hopes that I would stop wallowing after they were no longer haunting me in my closet. I said goodbye when I washed my sheets after I wished you were next to me. There were so many ways to say goodbye, and I did every single one.
You see, I realized that if you really wanted to see me, you would have wanted to make the effort after receiving my messages. You would have wanted to talk as much as I did, which means you would have wanted to reach out and ask me when I was free the minute you got home and had time to spare.
I'm not over you, I'm not sure if I ever will be. It's hard to let go of something that had you in a daze for over a year. I find pieces of you everywhere I turn. Some pieces reside within me. When I'm driving to work at 6:30 in the morning [with my coffee cup you got me for Christmas in hand] and pass a yellow car, I automatically murmur "Skittles" and picture you getting aggravated that I beat you to it. I catch myself saying the sarcastic little comments you would say under your breath after reading some ignorant article on politics. I had to walk outside in the pouring rain and the first umbrella I grabbed was the pink one you gave me as a gift and as a part of our favorite inside joke. Ironically, the minute I stepped outside with it, a car came speeding by and got me soaked from head to toe. I knew you would have been there to laugh and tell me my hair still looked fine. Nonetheless, when I realized that I had grabbed that certain umbrella, it made me smile, it made me happy to know that I was that lucky to have something so real.
I woke up this morning and the first thing on my mind wasn't you, and that's when I realized that I would eventually be okay. I'm going to close my eyes away from everything on the days that it all feels like too much. I'm going to continue to toss and turn after waking up from a dream about you. It will all hurt - it won't be the easiest when I hear "We're Going to Be Friends," but I'll make the most of it and remember that in those moments, I was beaming. I didn't care what my hair looked like, if I was covered in mud after a day of working with you, or if neither of us felt like going out and settled for Ramen Noodles for lunch and dinner.
So this is where I say goodbye to a love that changed my heart in a good and bad way. Please know that I am so proud of you for everything you have ever done and will do. Please know that I do not hate you and I never plan on hating you. Please know that you were my dream, and I needed to wake up eventually if you were never going to call and, instead, leave my optimism at an all time high. I need to find myself again, just with my heart guarded with walls a little bit higher and swelling with the memories and words you left there.
Never settle, take every opportunity that comes your way, and I will still be cheering you on from the sidelines, just like the number one fan I used to be for you.
