I don’t think anyone expected this to happen.

Hell, I didn’t expect this to happen.

They didn’t expect us to happen.

I didn’t expect you to happen.

My mind was like a romantic novel that had been misused and abused.

Left sitting closed on a shelf gathering dust.

But when we talked the first time, we really talked, and that was different for both of us.

How ironic it is, that we met at church camp.

Really, I had been questioning for months, but you were the first I had admitted to.

I had kept that locked away, but I told you.

Before anyone else, because I knew I could trust you.

I could hide it for the first couple of days, but you were different.

I knew that.

Because every time you went to hold my hand, sparks flew from my fingertips, travelled up my arms, and ignited my heart.

Sent my heartbeat through the roof and my stomach flipping.

And although this meant facing down one of my biggest fears, it was worth it.

I wanted my Romeo and Juliet love story and I was willing to work for it.

I wanted to give you everything you never had but always wanted.

Because you were my guiding star.

My light, my rock, my tragedy – straight out of a Shakespeare play.

You were my guiding light, and all I pray is for you to get me through this endless night, because the darkness I’m feeling isn’t just the absence of light, it’s the absence of you.

I know you’re afraid I’m going to regret this, but the truth is: I already do.

It’s my fault that you have such a big part of me.

In fact, there’s almost nothing left, but I have to keep going.

Because quitting would be like admitting there was nothing there in the first place.

I… I don’t regret what we had, but I do.

And I know they say to never regret something that once made you smile, at least for a little while, but what about you?

My one job was to make you happy, and I failed.

Miserably.

Do you know how much it hurts to see you smile because of them?

I’m caught between my sadness and my sympathy, because I want you to be happy, but it hurts to see.

And I know if our situations were reversed, you’d be so well-versed in sympathy that you would believe it yourself.

I just don’t understand.

What about me wasn’t enough?

Tell me, where did I go wrong?

Do we just not belong together?

I don’t know.

I don’t know how long it takes to make a relationship grow.

And I don’t know how to admit to you that you were my one and only.

My first and last.

Because this will never happen again.

I can’t afford it to.

I did love you, for however fleeting a time.

Maybe I shouldn’t have.

There’s an entire denomination telling me I’m wrong, but that didn’t stop me.

Not this time.

But maybe it should have.

Because every night when I think of you, I can still feel you.

I can still taste you.

I can still hear everything you told me that night.

I guess the thing that scares me most is that you understood better than any of those guys.

You didn’t push me for anything, and I don’t know if I’ll find a guy who understands the way you do.

Sorry, did.

It is the, “I will never hurt you the way they did,” that still echoes in my mind, and I suppose you’re right.

You didn’t hurt me the way they did, because you have a bigger piece of me than he ever did, even when he took my innocence as a challenge to be embarked upon.

And while he didn’t get that far, he got far enough.

But you… You made me feel whole again.

You must have some superhero complex because you’re always looking for someone to save.

And you give everything you have to try and rescue them, and you’ve got the scars to prove it.

But when you have a problem, you come to me.

How does it feel to know that your therapist cries about you?

How does it feel to know that the one you go to for relationship advice is the one who couldn’t stay in a relationship with you?

But I have to be honest here.

You are so much better off without me.

You are so much more than a pronoun.

You are so much more than your body.

You are so much more than your curves.

You are so much more than your words.

And I want you to know that you deserve more than me.

More than what I can give you, because I can tell a room full of strangers about us, but I can’t tell my own family.

And I probably never will.