I Still Miss You Whenever That Song Plays

Most days, you are the last thing on my mind.

Time does what it’s intended to, glosses over memories that were once impossibly vivid. The years keep spreading us farther apart in ways that are both heartbreaking and necessary. I do not know what city you live in, if your mother still owns that lovely white stucco house, if the girlfriend you loved after me still occupies your bed.

I can romanticize my feelings for you as much as I want, but the brutal truth is you’re a stranger now. You aren’t the boy I looked at and saw the word “forever” staring back at me. You aren’t the boy who brought me soup and hand drawn cartoons when I wasn’t feeling good. You aren’t the boy who told me, one day, you intended to marry me.

You’re a man now. And you’re a man I’ve never met.

But when that song plays, it’s like I’ve forgotten about all the distance.

I’ve forgotten how long it’s been since you’ve held my face in your hands and kissed my forehead.

“How long do you wanna be loved?
Is forever enough?
Is forever enough?”

I find you in these tiny moments. I don’t want to, but denying it feels like a losing battle. Your smile still exists in those lyrics. I replay the night we first heard it together, how we looked into each other’s eyes and, for the first time in my life, it wasn’t scary. It was comfortable, reassuring, like finally being home.

Most days, you are the last thing on my mind. But on those days when you are, on those days when music brings me right back to the place we fell in love, I’m afraid to admit you’re still everything that I want. You’re still resting somewhere deep inside my heart.