To Love And Be Loved

If you know how to love and you also have love, please, really take the time to think about life and cherish all the moments. See all the opportunities you have to spend life not alone. I once had love. A real love. It was right at my fingertips. Literally; his hands, rough but with soft delicate fingers that would embrace mine. His body, warm, the type of warm where every touch gives you butterflies. His lips, the very first mine would ever touch. And his name, so easy on the tongue. A name that I miss. I didn't know how to love him though, and well I didn't know I did love him. Not until he wasn't mine. Although he actually was never mine in the first place. What we had between us was never anything official. Like I said I didn't know how to love him, but I was never ready to let go of his love for me. I never saw it as me being selfish, otherwise I wouldn't have held on for so long. I guess I thought he would just know how I felt. I was horribly wrong. It's funny to think about because I remember clearly, telling him not to wait for me, which he still did. Kind of. That is of course until I was actually ready, and then that was part of our end. I played with his heart, and in return at times he played with mine too. Everything about our story is screwed up. Back then I didn't live my life doing all the things I wanted to do. A lot of my decisions I made based off of what my "friends" said and did. I will never forgive myself for that, because those decisions cost me myself. If you ask him about me he'll tell you how I broke his heart. About how he asked me out so many times never to get the answer he wanted. Except for one time, I was alone, nobody was around to influence me and he was the only one texting. He asked me out on messenger, understand this was maybe his 4th time so it being on messenger didn't matter. I said yes, I was so excited, I had always wanted to say yes, but being ashamed  and others influence always made me say no. And no, I was never ashamed of him, I was ashamed of myself, because of the demons from my past, that haunt me even today. Then I found myself sending him lies on why I couldn't date him, and I broke his heart even more. Even with that he didn't stop. Even when I was told he would never give up I still didn't know how to love him. Time went by and at different times we would distance ourselves, he'd have a girlfriend and I'd be alone with a broken heart I didn't know I had, but we'd always end up back in the same spot. Together. Even if it meant we were hurting others. Even if it meant we were hurting ourselves. Still, we were never anything official. Then, I was ready. I had been waiting for the perfect moment to ask him out. Things had been a little rough, he was acting odd, distancing himself, the same way he would do if he had found himself a new girlfriend. After a while of going back and fourth the way we did, I knew him so well. I saw all the signs of him slipping away. That's when I saw him kiss her. It was a different type of  hurt then I was used to. I realized in that moment that it was no longer because I didn't know how to love him that I could never be with him, it was because I was afraid to love someone so much it would hurt. Didn't help much. We didn't talk for about three months and then our parents started doing stuff together and so it seemed like naturally we were falling back into our same routine, and coming back together. When his lips touched mine for the very first time I didn't know it would be the last, though I didn't openly admit to it then. I really thought that kiss meant that he'd leave her like he did me for her. I was blindsided. Partly seeking revenge even though I didn't initiate it, I wanted it. Deep down I knew no matter what that he'd fight for her, just like I know if we would've been official he would've fought for me. She however, the girl he kissed could not forgive him for kissing me. She knew even when he didn't, what it meant for him to kiss me and so she let go. After that we tried just being friends again, and that's when he met her. The one he's still with. She had truly helped me come out of a dark place that I was in, she meant to much to me to hurt and so I let go too. I gave up on our games and always ending up back together, and in the end we both had broken hearts over a loss of each other. He never knew I loved him. He never knew how much he helped me. He never knew he was my best friend. He never knew I was planning on asking him out. He never knew that I already knew he had moved on before I saw that kiss. He never knew because I never told him. I never told him because I didn't know how to love somebody who loved me. Communication is key, so learn how to do it. I still haven't, and so he doesn't know I love him. He doesn't know how our memories help me. He doesn't know that I don't blame him. He doesn't know how many times I've had to restrain myself from calling him, how I want to touch his body, and feel the embrace of his hand just one more time. He doesn't know because I haven't told him. I haven't told him because he's the love that got away. And you're not supposed to chase the past. Contrary to how it may seem, I've accepted that he's the one that got away. I'm the one who let him go. When you love someone so much that it hurts the only way to stop the pain is to let them go. That's when you also realize exactly how much it hurt to love them, and letting go gets easier. The emptiness however, of not knowing what could've been never goes away. That's what gets ya, it's always the emptiness.