Ashes and Roses

I’ve been thinking, the only person I loved is the man who pretends we never met. Sometimes, when I’m at school, I try to find his bright sneakers in the middle of the crowd. I try to look at him, I try to see if he is looking at someone, even though I want him to look at me. I changed myself because of this guy — I changed my hair, my body, my clothes, my mind, my feelings, my personality… all because I wanted to impress him. And I was successful. But every single time he came back, I did something to screw up again. Not with this intention, but I did. I was just trying to make sure he wouldn’t run away again. But he always runs away. I should have known it before I let him do anything to me.

You can call me dumb, or whatever you want to call me; I know it seems silly. But that’s the whole point. I don’t know anyone who loved someone with this intensity. And my friends who did don’t know what it’s like to lose that person. And I feel guilty about it. I try to keep myself busy to avoid thinking about the things that I’ve done for him. Because maybe, if I just had a normal love, I wouldn’t have done the crazy stuff that I’ve done. Maybe, if I hadn’t sent him that message, or maybe if I had just said “no” when he proposed that we could be just friends with benefits… maybe he would have been interested enough to pay more attention to me. Maybe he would have had some pity.

He knew I was in love. Actually, he knows I’m still in love with him. And I know he likes it. He likes to play games with my head, he likes to approach my friends just when I’m talking only with them. But essentially, he likes to see my heart broken. He likes to see me cry over him. He loves to know that I’m there for him forever. He knows I’m not going to leave, because he knows that I’m stuck with him for the rest of my life.

I hate him. I hate when he pretends that nothing has ever happened between us. I hate to watch when he’s talking with that girl. I hate to see him with someone who is not me. But God, how I love it when I catch him looking at me at a party. I love when he smiles with that little smirk that makes me feel unreal. I love when I’m talking to someone and he’s close, watching me laugh. I love when he seems uncomfortable when I ignore him trying to get my attention.

Sometimes, I try to just hate him. I try to see all the shit he did. But I can’t forget all the good things that happened before everything went wrong. I remember the way he treated me, the way he touched my hand, the way he smiled at me, how he talked to me… I remember all our conversations. Literally all of them. I remember when he asked me what my dream declaration of love was. I remember when he told me I could count on him.

He was the first guy who showed me how I wanted to be loved. He gave me all I wanted. But when I showed him how much I was in love, he started to show exactly how I didn’t want to be treated. And, after that, everything went downhill.

But here I am, writing some stupid shit about a random guy I met when I was twelve, who has been my torture since 2023.

Love is overrated. Everyone thinks that love is a beautiful feeling, something that can make someone change for the better. But actually, it’s a sentence of death. When you catch yourself smiling like a child when you think about them, you know that you are fucked up. And the only thing I can promise you is: you won’t forget this person. Never. You can fall in love with others, but you will never be able to forget your first love. The love that broke your soul into a million pieces of sadness, loneliness, and despair.

It’s like a hole, a big hole filled with tears that I’ve been keeping hidden from the world. No one should ever feel this way. It feels like grief. It’s sad, it’s complicated, it makes you feel not enough… Do you know that feeling when you wake up after a good night with your friends, but no one is home anymore? It brings back that pain of emptiness. The pain of being afraid to lose moments.

Sometimes, this pain makes you feel stronger. Sometimes it serves to remind you that you already suffered the worst pain. You survived the worst days, you will survive everything else. But this pain is even worse than physical pain. I’m not even joking.

But now, I’m so tired of this hurt. I can’t handle it anymore. I’ve been trying for a long time. Some people say that I’m going to forget about him, they’re so sure of it; I would like to be that sure about it too. But every time I see him playing basketball, the only thing I can be sure is: I will never stop loving him.

I can’t help myself from watching his games. Actually, I want to see him playing because I know he likes it, he likes a big crowd cheering for him. He doesn’t even have to say it, I can see it. He loves to be cheered, to be complimented.

And he knows I like that too. But he never complimented me. It’s just like he’s so proud of himself that he doesn’t have any space left to be proud of others. It’s unbelievable! It makes me feel so bad about myself, but especially about him! He can’t see the good side of people, and if he sees it, he doesn’t speak about it; he keeps it to himself.

I don’t know what’s worse: being in love or hating someone. The thing is, I feel both ways about him. So, I’m literally living in my own particular hell. Even though we don’t talk anymore, I still feel butterflies when he’s around, or when he comes close to my friends to talk to them about some shit that’s usually about girls. Sometimes I think he does it on purpose. Because there’s no way that every time I’m around, he’s talking about girls. I can’t think of any other reason why he does that.

Sometimes I feel that wave—a hot, dark wave that goes through my chest every single time he gets close to me. It’s so uncontrollably intense that it makes me gasp and breathe even harder. He takes my breath away. I don’t show it; actually, I pretend I’m interested in something else, looking at the place as if I were contemplating the white, random walls. Just like a fool. The fool that I am.

I used to like it when he got naughty and boldly said those things I still think about when I’m alone at night. Things like, “Did you get excited?” or “This… that I’ve done… you like that?” When he said those things to me, I remember feeling that wave. Sometimes I just can’t believe that he did all that but never kissed me on the lips.

I know I shouldn’t have been so permissive with him, but I couldn’t help but let him do whatever he wanted with me. I thought about pushing his hands away, but I never did. I just couldn’t do anything. I was too in love with him to see that all that shit would haunt me for life. But still, I don’t regret anything. I would still let him do whatever he wants.

This is my curse—this blind and uncontrollable love for a man who doesn’t give a fuck about me, or my feelings, or anything that comes with me. It’s just like we’re strangers to each other. We pretend the other doesn’t exist. When he’s close, I look the other way and pretend he’s not there. It’s childish behavior, from both of us. But I know we’ll never stop coming back into each other’s lives. It’s an invisible string that keeps connecting us—a string we can’t break.