And Yet So Far

Emma - C L O S E

Jake was the guy of my dreams. Tall, blondish perfect hair, blue eyes, cheesy smile. Sweet, but also witty. Smart, but didn't talk in a language I couldn't understand. Popular, but not cocky, arrogant, or snotty. And just a touch of immaturity, the piece of him that made him who he was.

It was hard to know if he noticed me. He looked at me often during classes, but I looked at everyone else, too, yes, including him, but even so, I couldn't tell.

This went on a while, and I tried to smile at him if he looked at me. It was hard, to bring myself to smile when I knew he could just laugh in my face if he chose.

I might have gotten one smile out in all during that time.

But I doubt he saw.

And then he started hanging around this completely fake blond girl. And I grew to hate her. I pushed past that obstacle, intensifying my efforts to be noticed and to determine if he even cared I existed.

We never talked. No real conversations. The whole time I had know him, we must have exchanged a total of less than thirty words. And this is years we are considering.

Weeks passed, and Jake started dating the blond. I knew my fragile emotional barrier couldn't bear the strain. So I pushed him away.

I stopped trying to smile at him.

I stopped feeling flutters when he looked my way.

And it didn't seem like he did that much anymore, either.

I stopped looking his way.

I stopped hanging around my locker extra because that was near where he and his friends talked.

And on the day the blonde girl appeared wearing his jacket, I dropped my feelings for him altogether.

Instead of mentally cursing when I saw them hug, I smiled. Thought it was cute.

Instead of mentally choking when he would put his arm around her, I smiled.

And I went on his ask.fm page and told him it was cute how she had been wearing his jacket.

And when I had stopped my feelings, it was okay.

At first, I struggled moving on.

It had been three and a little more than a half months straight that I had liked him.

They say if you like someone for four months straight it's true love.

He was so close.

And yet so far.

I found other people to like, to smile about.

It was hard to narrow it down.

It was hard to put it on just one person and try to like them with the same intensity I had him.

And it took me a while.

I didn't get to that point.

Because that was when I found out Jake and the blonde had broken up.

Try as I might, I couldn't get details.

I could go back to liking Jake.

But after drawing myself away, I realized there were other people in the world.

People I liked.

And though I still had small feelings for Jake, they were a bit smothered.

After that almost heartbreak, it wasn't the same.

I knew I could never like him the same again.

It could never, would never be like before.

As time passed, my feelings grew slightly.

Not enough.

Just slightly.

If he had said something, things would have been different.

But he didn't.

And I was afraid.

I clutched my other lifelines tightly.

I devoted my attention to the others I had turned to when he betrayed me.

And I was happy again.

Those others and I talked. Laughed. Smiled.

Jake and I, we had never done any of that. So we lost nothing.

Just hope for what had never really been there.

My feelings, however rebuilt, slipped away among the laughter and smiles of the others and I.

I didn't need Jake anymore.

I had found a way of life without.

And while it was amazing during our time, every time has an end.

And ours had passed.

We had lost what once might have been there, however one sided.

We had lost it.

I cannot help but think, though, that we were at three and a little more than a half months.

Out of four.

We were so close, Jake, so close.

And yet so far.