Dear Darling, ✓

      Five years. Five years is the amount of time I loved you. At least I think I loved you. Maybe it was something more minimal, more childish. Maybe it was love, it burned like love. A fire against my flesh, leaving a shy ache where your gaze brushed. But I felt something for you for a long time, I know that much.
     I saw your eyes in my sleep, your smile in my daydreams. Your poetry rang in my head like those songs that they play over and over until everyone is sick of them. Every song rang your name. Every note whispered the possibility of a future together. As intangible and faded as you were, those blue eyes felt as familiar as my own. I saw you in my soul, darling. In the deepest parts of me. I never needed myself the way I needed you. My curls echoed your own. My hand yearned to be pressed into yours. I was more childish in those days I'm afraid.
     But we drifted, became different people. My feelings faded like the spring when winter began ripping the once green leaves from the limbs. It was slow at first, a sway of a branch knocking a few leaves away. One by one, day by day, months became years and I forgot. I forgot the feelings though I imagine I'll never forget you. You still hold a part of me, the most hidden part but I no longer desire your lips against my knuckles.
     And we grew. You still write poetry and I still paint. But we are two different entities. I no longer see your eyes in mine. I no longer see the bright blue ones hiding my hazel ones. But anytime I think of your smile in the moonlight or your noir hair, a smile fills the hole you left. A hole you were never aware you held, a home you never knew you had.
     I no longer need you, darling, as I once did. I no longer need your scent in my skin or your eyes masking my own. Because within you, I found myself.