Dear You,
I’m not really sure where to start.
Maybe because I’m not totally sure about what to say to someone who used to know me so well, but I haven’t spoken to properly in….well, a while.
Or maybe it’s because some things are just easier to write when you know that the person that they’re meant for will never read them.
We’d known each other for a long time. Longer than we hadn’t. You were there for so much of my childhood that sometimes it’s impossible to separate the memories from you. There are so many versions of each other that we knew, and maybe that’s why I used to find it so hard to let go. Because letting go of you means letting go of a piece of myself.
The young me. The weird me (though those who know me now would argue that I’m still plenty weird). The awkward me. The version of me who was not even trying to figure out who she was.
You knew me then.
And I think that’s what I miss the most, if I’m being honest.
Not simply you; but someone who knew me then.
I know when things started changing, but I’m not sure why. Yeah, we were growing up. We had different interests. Different priorities. But just because people are different doesn’t mean that they can’t be friends. So I searched for an answer. But maybe that’s just life. You don’t always get one.
I think for a long time the problem was that I really wanted one. I needed one. I wanted to point to a single event or action or activity and be able to say, “This is where it all went wrong. This is what changed everything.” Something that would tell me exactly why someone who had once been so interwoven in my life was becoming someone I barely spoke to.
But after spending a lot of time thinking about it – longer than I should have– I realised that there wasn’t one. All that was there was time.
Hours that became days and days that became weeks. Texts and conversations that became shorter, less frequent, and less impactful. Realising that the little things that I would have once told you without thinking were now things I never said to you at all.
It was hard. Because there was no huge fight. No big, dramatic moment where everything just fell apart. Just me, and my gradual realisation that I was attempting to hold on to something whose weight was not being held equally by both sides.
And I think for a while I blamed myself. For the breakdown of our friendship. I wondered if I should have tried harder, fought longer. If I had just noticed the cracks earlier, maybe we’d still be each other’s first call after something big happened. I wondered if I could have changed the ending. Because that’s what you always hear, right? That there was always a choice. That where there’s a will, there’s a way. So I kept showing up. Thought that if I reached out a little more, if I said the right thing, maybe we could go back to what we once were.
But that’s just not how it works.
Because for it to work, both people have to want to stay. Sometimes, even though you hold on with both hands, you can still be left with nothing but memories. Once I figured that out, I stopped holding myself responsible for everything, and by then, letting go felt just a little too easy.
I’ve realised that I don’t think that our friendship failed. I think it just ended.
There’s a difference.
Because today, as I write this letter, as I look back at everything we shared, I no longer feel sad. I feel strangely grateful. For all the years, the time, the memories. For all the versions of each other that we knew before we became strangers. I’m grateful we had each other when we needed it. I’m grateful to have been known so well, even if it was never meant to last forever.
I don’t know if you ever really think of me anymore. Maybe you do. Maybe you don’t. But honestly, I’m ok not knowing.
I don’t really know you anymore, but I hope that you have someone to call when something amazing happens, and someone when it feels like it’s all falling apart. And I hope that occasionally, in the middle of all of that, you remember me too.
Not because I want us to be back in each other’s lives. But because once, a long time ago, we mattered to each other.
So I guess that this is a final goodbye. Not one that has to be said or even heard, just goodbye to a version of us that no longer exists.
I’ll always remember you.
Love,
Ayera