I really miss you right now. I miss you in an aching, painful, longing way of wondering what would've happened if things would've turned out differently.

There are days when I can lose myself in life and forget about your eyes for a moment. Days when I can laugh away the memory of your smile. Those days are easy, but few.

Then there are days where I can't bear to hear your name. The smallest thing brings up the biggest memory of you. Days where there is an unexplainable, unforgiving ache in the middle of my chest that won't stop pulling and tugging and longing for your touch. Days where I see other couples on the street and imagine you and I and the hands that fit so perfectly together locked between us. Where I see pictures of you and remember exactly the way your lips felt against mine, the taste of you real and raw and for an instant I'm back in your arms but it's gone as soon as it came and I'm left with a twisted, broken, sweet-smelling memory that I'll carry as long as I live like a backpack of rocks.

We still talk. We still talk but the messages are short and forgettable. We still talk but I don't get that feeling in the pit of my stomach, that excitement and anticipation I used to get when I was waiting for a reply. We still talk but I haven't heard from you in weeks.

Some days, I picture you here with me because that would've changed so many things. But life goes on and decisions have to be made no matter how deep of a scar they leave when you finally have to sever the bond that connects the two of you together. A bond deeply formed by 3 A.M. conversations and laughter and tears shared over hard times and deep thoughts and inside jokes and knowing what his favorite flavor of gummy bears was. A bond that, when fractured, did not grow back stronger but on the contrary remained that way until it had to be cut by the knife of reality.

You were always stubborn and I found it endearing until it ruined any chance we had of being together. You had your ways and I had mine and those ways could never cross, never connect no matter how much I wanted them to, but it was entirely impossible and unreasonable to keep heading toward the edge because I knew we were going to fall off. So I decided to jump on my own. And it is a hard fall to recover from.

You were willing to straddle the edge, work a way around it, find another path down the mountain and into the valley of trial and tribulation but I could see through the haze that so blinded those big brown eyes of yours. There was no other path, but rather a jagged rocky road that we could take but it would've cut us and battered us and broken us until we were too mangled to recognize one another. I couldn't go down that path, I wasn't willing. I wasn't able. But you were, you were unconditionally in love and I felt terrible for leaving you with an unrequited longing for what we could've had.

My way was easier, though. You might've felt like you took the worst of it but in reality my heart completely broke in half at the thought of jumping off the edge and never returning, leaving you alone and abandoned and lost. It showed in the way the water streamed from my eyes, the way my chest heaved in loud wails of brokenness, the way my pain turned into anger and my anger turned into resentment at spending so long with you when it was my fault all along.

I do miss you. So much. And as much as I want what we had, I don't want what we'll have if we try again. By this point you're too broken and resentful to try again because you and I both know it won't end beautifully. Our story will forever be a tragic one because sometimes people are only in your life for a short while and you make the unconscious decision to love them, and then when it's their time to leave there's nothing you can do but protect the lovely memories and regret the things you didn't do while you still had them. There will be days when you miss them and the only thing to do is to curl up into a ball and sit through the numbing pain until your heart decides to let go and your body decides to heal the deepest wounds and it may take days or months or even years but the storm will at last pass.