Work Text:
It’s ironic how people look at us and try to find a word for it. They want a label, a neat box to put us into. Boyfriends, lovers, friends, colleagues, roommates. None of those words quite fit. Too clean, too small, like trying to catch a downpour with your bare hands.
We never had a first date. We never had an anniversary to cross off the calendar. No quiet conversations about our future. I used to think that meant we were nothing. “We’re only friends, nothing more”, you used to say when the nights got too quiet, too intimate. Perhaps you were right. Maybe we were nothing more. I used to think so too. I think we both crossed that line long before. Maybe when you held onto me tight in autumn, or when we kissed in winter. Or maybe it was somewhere entirely different.
I see you standing there, just out of arm's reach, laughing at something someone else said. You look so ordinary like that. My hands will feel too empty. The bed will be too light some nights. If we tried to hold hands normally, we would probably just bleed. I was drawn to you, I always have been. I was a moth and you were the flame, but a flame can burn on their own.
So no, I won't cry because you never called me yours. That would be an insult to whatever this was. No title was ever necessary to prove you changed the trajectory of my entire life. We were never together. You were never mine. You were only an experience, one that slipped through my fingers. Perhaps we’ll meet again in another life. Maybe, but I won’t live my life chasing after a fantasy. You’ve already moved on. Maybe it’s my turn to as well.