a dear boy letter

Dear Boy,

It's been almost a year since you left.

I can still remember the way your hand felt on the back of my head, the heaviness of your body that time we napped together in my broken futon in my Gainesville apartment. I remember the exact look on your face when you stared at the ceiling and told me that my father must be fucked up; the way your lips pursed together when you smiled at me and rubbed my knee. If I put enough thought into it, I can hear every single word you whispered to me that night in Missmo's den.

I cried for days when you left. I was like Diane Keaton in Something's Gotta Give – as soon as I opened my eyes in the morning, the flood of tears would stain my pillow, and I'd roll over, not wanting to face the day if the day didn't bring you. Even when I'd be out with the girls, drinking and dancing and laughing and having fun, you'd always be in my thoughts. And then, if the night had been long enough and I'd had just enough Bacardi, I'd hide my face in the backseat so nobody would see me silently cry on the way home.

I couldn't understand how things were so different when you left. It was as if when you crossed the state border, all that intensity, all that earth-shattering magic stayed in Florida. I told you to abandon all rational thinking and to just follow your heart, like I did. You wouldn't though. You held on to real life and real life problems – jobs, money, distance, difficulty. And just like that, as you said, you "walked out of my life."

It took me months to get over you. It wasn't until a sweltering day in August, sitting on my mom's lanai, when I realized that it was all so wrong from the beginning. Nothing healthy is ever that intense. Your world views suck, and your competitive streak would never mesh with mine. I was a fool to believe it was right. It was the relationship and its loss that I couldn't get over, not you. It was having somebody who understood me on much more than a superficial level and appreciated me for who I was, who I am, and who I will be that I longed for, not you. And with that, I was over it.

Weeks sometimes go by when I don't even think of you. I have successfully banished you from my thoughts. But lately, you've been coming back in my dreams, and that I can't control, no matter how hard I try. I've always dreamt of you, but they used to be terrible, heart-breaking dreams wherein you are there but want nothing to do with me, or you are there but you're with somebody else. I'd wake up from these dreams feeling empty, sad, and remorseful. The entire day would be grey.

The recent dreams, however, have been nothing short of beautiful. In one, we're sitting together, Indian-style, discussing the romanticism of Hemingway's A Farewell to Arms, my favorite love story ever. The colors are bright, the mood is light, but still, I hate this dream. It reminds me of what is and what could never be. I might have been your Catherine Barkley, but you, my dear, were never my Fredrick Henry.

Last night was a new one. We dive into the ocean together, like we did that day we spent alone on your family's boat, and let the sea salt cake our bodies and our hair. I don't remember any more details, just you and me and the sea. But I know that I'll be thinking about you all day now. And mostly, I'll be thinking about the possibility that next month, fate may have us cross each other's paths again.

Part of me hopes that it doesn't, part of me hopes that it does. But all of me wishes that for the time being, you wouldn't haunt my dreams. I finally got you out of my thoughts, now please get out of my dreams.

Sincerely,

Curly Girl