beneath the surface

I saw you today.

We were stopped at the same intersection. I was going north, you were going south. I knew it was you instantly. You never even noticed me. I felt my breath catch in my throat, and the chill that went down my spine was paralyzing. Instinctively, I grabbed my phone and dialed your number; my heart sank when I realized you’ve changed your number since we last talked.                 You drove away.

To this day, I haven’t conquered the stranglehold you’ve always had on me. In high school, I felt as though I wasn’t good enough for you  —  I treasured every kiss, every touch, as though it were the last I would receive. I sacrificed parts of myself I can never get back, hoping that you would see how much I needed you. The day you left, something inside me died. I changed so much for you that I didn’t even know who I was anymore. All I knew was the person I was around you, and you were g o n e . . .I didn’t know what to do with myself anymore.

Maybe it was that you were three years older than me, that I was only 15 and it was so forbidden…Maybe it was the secrets you kept from me, and the voice in my heart that constantly told me I wasn’t the only one in your life. Maybe it was how desperately I wanted to be the only one in your life.

I’m not sure what it was, but something inexplicably linked me to you. I fell harder, cried longer, hurt deeper than I ever have before. And regardless of what has happened in my life since then, a person simply doesn’t forget something like that.

What would have happened if you had noticed me today? Would we have talked? Would I have told you about Matt? About how that boy is my world, and I never knew I was capable of loving someone as much as I love him? Would I have told you that I’m finally getting my life together, and that things are going so well? Or would I have reverted to 15-year-old Hillary, and done everything in my power to make myself desirable to you?

I’d like to think I’m a stronger person now, that I wouldn’t still feel this gut-wrenching pain every time our paths cross, but this twinge in my stomach as I write this is telling me differently. It’s not even that I still feel the way I used to about you, but no one has ever affected every aspect of my life the way that you did, and that’s something I’ll probably never recover from.