I was brave. I was brave and it stabbed me in the back. I told you that I liked you. In the middle of the night (2:19 am, to be exact), while I was laying on my stomach and you were laying on your back and your roommates were stumbling drunk outside your door.
The beginning: we met September 5, 2010. When we weren't in class, we spent almost every moment (waking and asleep) together. Watching movies (X-Men, Whip It, (500) Days of Summer), listening to music (City and Colour, The Black Keys, Death From Above 1979), and talking. I haven't opened to anyone like that in a long time (over a year). You made me laugh and for the first time since him, I felt special. (It's not a feeling I get to experience a lot, that's something I haven't told you). Then, the last week of October happened and because of your parents, you bailed on a trip that I was really looking forward to. So, for November and that first week and a half of December,
We came back from the holidays and it's been twenty days of us being constantly in each other's company and I wondered why we stopped last semester. What happened to us? So, after being told by everyone (it sounds like blame displacement, it's not. It's fact.), I finally brought up the courage, and I told you. (You were the second guy I said, "I like you," to. And the first one I said it to in person. The first guy dated my sister instead. I guess I'm moving up in the world.)
You'd talked about your ex-girlfriend. I never got a name, and last night you told me it was because, that way, you could get away with talking about her and I wouldn't know. You don't love her, not like that, not anymore. And you know it sounds stupid, but, it's like you're waiting, for a chance, a chance, that maybe, one day, it'll work out again. Funny how, the information I was patient about and didn't push you about, was the stuff that made me want to bolt from your bed and throw up. But I didn't.
"I'm sorry."
"What do you have to be sorry for?"
You didn't answer after that, and I rolled over, my hand clenching the pillow, trying my hardest to pleaseZeusIcan'tcrynotyet and managed to sleep. I bolted at quarter to nine (I've never done that, by the way, Fantasia's still there. I won't be picking it up.). And I've cried twice today. It's a record, really. I'm the emotional one. It's disgusting, really. But I am. My sister and roommate both think I need to show you that I'm surviving without you (I will, I always do.), but, in all honesty, I want you to see that, maybe without knowing, you broke me. I can't blame you for that, but that doesn't erase that it's still a fact.
I waited three months to tell you how I felt. And everyone thought I was stupid, that we were just 'turtle love', taking too long to acknowledge what was fact. We took pictures together (no one gets to take mine, and yet you've taken dozens), we were going to watch Beauty & the Beast together (it's our favourite Disney movie), you downloaded Tangled for me, and you let me read you Le Love before falling asleep. Before we'd fall asleep at night, we'd spend hours talking (I'm realizing how much of it was about her), and I told you all that stupid irrelevant stuff because you asked.
Last night you said all your female friends hate her, that it's not fair. I can agree to both sides. My first thought was that I wanted to shake her. Now, I just want to ask, "Why would you let him go?" because it was the biggest mistake she's made, I can say that without hesitation, reservation, or discrimination.
I want to be mad at you. I really do. But I can't. And that almost hurts as much. I'll have to see you tomorrow. We're in the same course, and while we're not in the same section, running into each other is destined to happen. I'd say I'd deserve it, falling for someone like you, but I don't. I really, really don't.
"& then he said, 'I'm sorry, but I've found my soulmate. & it's not you.'"
Funny, that's been my favourite quote for a long, long time. And even now, I still find it as heartbreakingly beautiful as the first time I heard it.
