My dear,

There are some people who enter our lives to change the way we understand safety. You were that for me. 

When I think of us now, I think of us in textures. Quiet afternoons, chilly nights, bike rides, stupid fights, kisses on the nose. Two kids lost in the haze of a sweet sweet feeling. But more, I remember who I was when I was with you. The feeling of being held like a little child without needing an explanation. The rare relief of not having to defend who I was or why I felt the way I did. 

You saw me in a season where all the buds around me were blooming and I was still learning how to breathe. And you did something no one had done for me, ever. You made my world feel less sharp. 

I’ve been thinking about how strange it is that two people can share so much closeness and still walk away carrying entirely different lessons. Time has passed, and I can feel what has changed in me and what hasn’t.

What’s the same is that I still believe what we had was real. That it mattered and it shaped me in so many ways. It was love even when it was imperfect and overwhelming and so, so messy. I love with the same intensity still. I still write handwritten letters and love when I’m held like a child. I still crave safety.

What has changed in me, is how I understand myself inside love. 

I know now, that then I was learning how to exist while being loved. Feeling alive for the first time in my life. You know how they say sometimes you cannot save the drowning person, they just drag you with them. I know I was dragging you down. I know now, that I asked for too much sometimes and gave too little. But none of it came from a place of wanting to hurt you. It came from fear, confusion, from a broken and endless pit of pain and ache and starvation. I was a broken damaged kid who didn’t have a reason to live on. I did not know how to hold pain without spilling it everywhere. I was jealous you had the safety I didn’t. I wanted to consume all of it. 

We were both young and we were both assholes. In the way people are when they don’t know what love asks of them, or what it costs. Love is a terrifying thing when you don’t have a map for it. It exposes parts of you you didn’t know existed. It makes you act in ways you don’t fully understand until later. 

I have stopped confusing love with destiny anymore. I know now that you can love someone and still let them go. That you can love someone so deeply that you know no other way than to hurt them. 

What we shared was a necessary chapter. 

I want you to know this: I am grateful. 

Thank you for giving me the belief that I am lovable. Thank you for loving me without any conditions, for being selfless in ways my damaged brain didn’t even understand at the time. For giving me space to grow and heal, when I know it wasn’t that easy for your kid brain too. 

Thank you for being my knight in shining armor. Thank you for making me brave enough to believe that I am something. 

You gave me proof through your presence, that I deserve gentleness. That being held and touched can feel quiet instead of frightening. 

You gave me the world when I didn’t know how to hold it. And I did love you. So, so, so much. Truly, madly, deeply. I still carry that love inside me as something warm and fuzzy.

I am sorry for the ways I hurt you. I did not know pain still counts even when it isn’t intentional. I am sorry for making you feel less than. I am sorry for not validating your feelings. I am sorry for not holding on to you when things got difficult. I am sorry for not forgiving you more. I am sorry for everything I did, knowingly or unknowingly, that hurt you in any way, shape or form. I know I wasn’t the easiest. 

And I forgive you. For the times you made me feel like I was wrong to lower my walls. Like I was not enough. For making me feel like I was being taken advantage of for my intelligence and wit. For lying and for making me feel like I was not enough. For leaving when things got difficult and messy. I know now, you were just trying not to drown with me. I forgive you for your actions that hurt me. I’ve always told your parents how well they have raised you, and now I tell this to you as a friend and well wisher. Remember how I used to joke, I won’t hate you even if you pack me in a suitcase and sell me to a Sheikh? I know it was naive and stupid and dramatic, but it is true, I still don’t hate you. 

But I also don’t love you anymore. 

I don’t see our story as a failure now. I see it as a chapter that did exactly what it was meant to do. It made us grow and change. 

I don’t need to hold on to you to honor what we had. I don’t need to rewrite the past or compete with the future. What mattered and once scared me has already happened. It lives in me as knowledge. I have the map now. I am learning how to carry myself with the same care and innocence I once learned from being with you. I’m looking at myself. Still not more than a second. But I count it as progress. 

What feels different, is the way love sits in my life now. It doesn’t feel like rescue anymore. It feels quieter, steadier. More like a choice rather than a lifeline universe has thrown at me. There is space for mutual growth, for care that moves both ways, for building something rather than surviving inside it. I am still not lowering my walls, but I don’t feel the need to disappear. I’m finally growing into a place where love can exist without entirely consuming either person. 

I hope life is as kind to you as you were to me, my dear. I hope you feel steady, respected and loved. I hope you have the map now too. I hope you are kinder to yourself. You read and travel and eat and grow. I hope you find, and always have peace and ease. 

Your friend,
Swarali