sometimes you just have to express to your friends that you love them and they’ll say it back to you and vice versa and you don’t even have to use the word love all the time. i got out of the car of a friend i knew i wouldn’t be seeing for a long time and impulsively yelled love you; they rolled down their window, half laughter half disbelief, as they asked if i’d just said i loved them. i laughed back as they pulled away. an online friend told me once that it was absurdly easy to be human with me and that they had many online friends but i was very dear to them. (they were the first to show me that i could just tell people I loved them, that love could flow as freely and easily as the light between our hands). i made a joking comment once about deserving all attention all the time and was sincerely told ‘you do; everyone i care about deserves everything’. (i couldn’t bring myself to tell him i loved him back, but i told him it was easy to see why he is so Adored, that his tenderness always stops me in my tracks). my friend tells me he loves me everytime he bids me goodnight and i’ve never said it back but i write him poetry he’ll never see. love is tender and it is soft and when you have it, you have to hold it tight in your hands, cupped like a little flame. but love is also bright and golden and that light needs to be reflected back on those who shone it upon you. so tell your friends you love them, let them know that they too are loved, in whichever way you can.
(and since some of the friends I’m talking about are chronic tumblr users, if you ever see this, i love you and i love you and i love you and i hope that love echoes through time to reach you whenever you read this)
