For Her, Who Always Thinks of Him

He was there . . . physically present, yet mentally unaware of my ambivalence.

I was always here . . . patiently waiting with a tape sealed onto my lips as I raked for the "could have been's" when we were still young, callow, and full of life.

Would it have ended differently if I let it happen in an instant? Or let it all go with the flow as he drifted away into someone else's life, effortlessly turning their life upside down like a whirling tornado just like what he lead me into?

Beforehand, we had it all figured out.

We shared a lot of laughs.

We created a barrier around as if the whole world circulated around our own axis.

We made ourselves our own getaway.

A getaway from all the judgement, criticism, and never-ending envy. The glue that held us together so tightly it made everyone coo in delight, as the others gazed at us with bitterness. Visibly yearning for a friendship like ours. Although, they wanted more than what we have. It made me think that they were selfish. Then, it suddenly struck me like a lighting rampaging inside the eye of a storm.

I was one of them.

Our friendship - was it enough for me? Does he appreciate my presence just like I do when I'm with him? Does he notice whenever I feel mad or sad when I am incapable of voicing out my rampant thoughts, just like I do when he remains quiet for the rest of the night? Does he feel the same way when I look at him like he was the greatest thing that ever happened to me?

Does he feel the same way?

The question floated inside my head, obnoxiously ringing into my ears, vividly blinding my vision. That simple question that made me realize that wanting him only for myself was overwhelmingly cynical. My feelings for him were partly hollow that I can never explain it coherently and even prove it to anyone the lucidity of my feelings.

Was this all an illusion? A dream boat I have built all by myself as I sailed into the sea full of late night conversations, mixed signals, hilarious moments, and endless bickering?

The memories I had with him were saccharine, slowly creeping into the depths of my mind and into every nook and cranny of my heart.

Surely enough, I was just overthinking. This one time, in a chat box we shared back in our high school days, he confessed that I was:

Amazing; whenever I advise him about sappy relationship tips,

Hilarious; whenever I reminisce about my humiliating childhood moments as he ridiculed my hideous fashion taste,

And absolutely adorable, whenever I send him a picture of me holding my dog, Chuck, with a huge grin plastered on my face.

The way he described the entirety of my whole being heartened me. Until a pang of sadness washed over me as I remembered how he would blabber non-stop about the girl of her dreams.

Her.

Oh, how I remembered the day he told me about her. A small part of me was chanting joyfully, while the bigger part of me wanted to rip off her silky black hair, flawless skin, pearly white teeth, and hypnotic brown eyes. Oh, the way he described her sparked a minuscule hope in me that has been waiting to be lit up by the guy who held my heart for as long as I can remember. But, then again, I convinced myself that I was delusional to think that he was enamored by my personality, while he praised the girl he liked appearance-wise.

How ironic it was that I was the one who encouraged him to tell her how he feels.

Yet here I am, trying to tell myself that the feelings I have for him was just a pigment of my imagination.

Here I am, afflicted by their blooming romance.

The minuscule effort I had in me to cling onto something we never had was lessening.

While he took all his time and effort, along with ever fiber in his body to please the girl that he liked.

Loved? Far from it.

According to him, he was not ready for love. The thought of it was hidden on the back of his mind, waiting patiently for the right girl to cradle it into her everlasting arms.

"What if she was the one?" was not the question that stayed on my mind as I pondered on that thought.

The question that lingered, and relentlessly gnawed on my heart was: "Was I the one for him?"

For all my life I instantly knew that I was not worthy enough for him. The hope I had for us was deteriorated because of my self-deprecating thoughts.

I did what I felt was right . . .

But I knew was wrong.

I let him go.

Now we're finally released from the tenacious grip of Fate, reeling away from the land of imagination we built ourselves when we were at the age of exploration and newfound discoveries. The future we have been waiting for was now living in the present, satisfying us for what we wanted years before, but not what we needed. His name occasionally surpasses my mind, but I never further reminisced about the past we had.

The past we had was left behind, decaying slowly as we headed onto our mundane lives.

What we had was short-lived, yet full of love.

It might not be the intimate kind of love with full of hugs and kisses, the one that I hopefully yearned for.

Albeit was purely platonic, sadly enough to say.

And shamefully, it was all my fault that I have failed to see what the future might offer us someday. The fear I had of not seeing him again gnawed on my chest, overpowering the faint hope I had that what we had might turn into a happy ending - just what I envisioned in the films I've watched when I was young and hopelessly enamored with the thought of falling in love.

What stayed with me the most is the thought that I was eternally grateful that I met a guy like him. A guy who was nonchalant yet carefree, charmingly good-looking, slightly confusing at times, and incredibly soft-hearted.

There were moments that I wished he never have entered my life altogether. But the mature side of me came to the realization that at least we had something to remember by.

That something might not mean to anybody.

But to me . . .
              it meant the whole world.

* * *

February 14, 2016
Sunday
1:23 a.m.