We settled in like old friends from the moment we met.

You knew how to love me, and I learned quickly how to be loved.

Our chemistry was unmatched; our magnetism explosive and unquestionable.

We were the friends who knew it was best to hold each other at arm’s length, but still ended up in bed together anyway.

I just couldn’t resist you, nor you, me.

I’ll never forget the way you looked at me when I drove you home that Valentine’s Day. We weren’t together yet. But as we passed the park at 2 a.m. with my bike crammed in the trunk of your tiny car, you looked at me and asked if you had to go home.

We crashed into my bed like the world was ending, colliding like bodies determined to dissolve space and time and merge into each other.

I stood for a long time staring up the road when you left the next morning. You changed me that night, and I couldn’t get enough of how you made me feel.

I remember our first adventure together when you lovingly handed me snacks as I drove us through the mountains still speckled with snow. I remember blaring our playlist and marveling at the million ways each song sang directly to the journey we were sharing.

I remember how I’d be in the shower with that playlist on and I’d hear a new song. You’d added it without saying anything. I’d stand there, more awash in the similarities of our hearts than the water running over me.

I’d bring you lunch. Do you remember? We’d give the old folks something to gossip about as we hid in your office cubical and pretended to talk about work while we got lost in each other’s scent.

I couldn’t get enough of you.

When we slept, I couldn’t sleep close enough to you. The nights we spent apart were torture on my heart. I’d finally found you, I thought, and I didn’t want to spend another night without you sleeping by my side.

You made me reconsider my determination to never have more children. It wasn’t anything you said, it was just the way you hunkered down in my imagination.

I’d close my eyes and see you carrying our baby up a gentle hill back in Maine, a basket of blueberries on your arm, your beautiful honey hair blowing in the breeze. I’d imagine the two of us cooking breakfast in the cedar scent of some cabin. Built in the mountains by our own four hands—we’d raise walls around us to shelter our love.

You made me see the ways in which I was lovable. You made me feel special and worthy.

I’ve carried these things beyond the ending of our time together, but they still bear your monogram.

We loved so well, and so deep, and so pure. I needed and wanted you in every way.

I see now how wounded I was when we met, and I know I wasn’t able to show up for you the way you needed. It wasn’t that I failed you, just that I needed to learn to love myself before I could ever meet you in that cabin or on that hill.

And I think you had some healing to do, too.

Perhaps we could’ve loved each other through those hard lessons, but I think we had to lose to really learn them.

I think we made the right decision, though sometimes I still miss you. It’s both, and that’s okay.

Wherever we end up, and wherever you go, I just hope you know. We were great.

Thanks for everything,

~ Me