Between Dreams & Reality

Sometimes the most precious things in the world are meant to fly free. They are only yours for a moment before they go away, leaving you with what-ifs. I've had the experience of being in relationships before, however, this was the first time I was truly happy. I couldn't have asked for anything more. She was fresh coffee brewed in the morning. Falling for her was like summer rain. First drizzle, then hurricane; With thunders, with lightning, heavy and fast, meant to dishevel, but never to last.

I remember the first time we talked. There was an immediate connection, like an invisible thread tying us together. Something strong and unbreakable. When I say unbreakable, I mean that no matter how we tried to distance ourselves and un-feel each other, the invisible string kept pulling us back together.

Even though it was completely different than any other relationship I've been in before; it was the kind that really made me reflect a lot and therefore wonder.

If only she had stayed, I may have loosened our threads to find my own breath, or more likely, I would have held my breath longer just to be another note in her melody. We will never know now what might have been then. She changed our destiny, my light source, and my trajectory. I thought our story was written in the starlight of our days and nights - always present, always true, always leading us to each other. Now, I am with another, but I often wonder.

I never got to tell her that she was the tomorrow I always wished for; I never told her that for a moment she was the flicker of sunlight against my indigo sky. I loathe I never said it, but now I think I should. Her memory fills my heart with smiles and sadness. It's a strange balance. I imagine she has moved on though, that she has turned the page. I wish that it was different, that our story didn’t end.

I didn’t need to prove my feelings to know they were true because what I've known in my past doesn't come close to the experience I shared with her. Have you ever met someone who just gets you, understands you, completes you? Someone who, although you were in your darkest hour, made you feel like you were doing exactly what you were meant to do and being everything you were meant to be. I can’t imagine it happens more than a few times through the course of our lives.

A person who freed your heart from the shackles of shame and allowed you to begin living your life again. Someone who made you feel like you were in exactly the right place at exactly the right time and in that moment, nothing else mattered.

If we are lucky, we recognize the importance of this person before it is too late. But unfortunately, I feel like all too often, we are left looking back, wishing we had done more, wishing we had fought harder, plead stronger, and held on longer.

When I think of the love that could have been, my memory always shows me her face. There was a time when my vision of a perfect future involved her as my co-star. We had a connection I’d never felt before and when I was with her, I was the best version of myself. That beautiful and rare connection could have been a fixture of every day for the rest of our lives – at least that’s what I thought. What we had, seemed so solid until all of a sudden, it wasn’t.  She got cold feet. Maybe I asked for too much.

I like to think she loved me, as much as she then could. But no! She said she was too young to love, or was she just too reckless to take me seriously! I suspect she took for granted the way she made me feel.

The hardest thing about letting go was realizing what could have been. I’ll never run my hands through her hair. Never lay in bed with her right there. Never walk with her hand in mine. Never rest my head on her shoulder, getting away from the light and flair. Never kiss her in the morning, when her hair is all messed up. Or run my hands over her neck, give her back a rub. Sometimes I wonder how it would feel to walk with her through the breeze. But then I think it’s better like this, to just imagine the taste of her kiss.

I know she still has feelings for me. What’s more, I know I still have feelings for her. And if I’m being honest with myself, I will never not feel anything for her. Because the truth is, I’m not prepared to let go of her. I’m not prepared to say that everything’s perfect the way it is, because, as happy as I may be now, I miss her. I miss us.

So, as I sit down, pen in hand, determined to be able to say that the words that are not about her, outweigh the ones that know of nothing but her smile, and the soft caress of her hands, my mind keeps on going back to her, because she was home, and no matter how far I run away, I'll always end up back home.

Then again, no amount of eloquent prose or poetic license could ever truly capture the complexity of who she is or what she meant to me. For she is more than words on a page, more than the sum of my writings—she is a person who once filled my life with color. Now a poignant shadow in my mind, that may never come into existence. This is the time I have to confront the heartbreaking reality that in my dreams, she’s mine; but in my life, she’s just but a dream.