UNREQUITED ???? - by Nomshu Writes✨

Sometimes I miss who you pretended to be before I found out everything. Then I remember… I was only 18 the night we met fresh into my first year of university, soft-hearted, naive, untouched by the kind of disappointment that changes a person. I still believed people meant the sweet things they said. I still believed consistency and love naturally came together. And then there was you. Fifth year. Tall, dark, effortlessly handsome with that dangerous calmness about you. Full hair, neat goatee, deep laugh, slow confidence. The kind of man who walked into a room and made people look twice without even trying. You carried experience like expensive cologne subtle, but impossible to ignore. You swept me off my feet so beautifully. Late-night walks around campus while the world slept. Your hoodies around my shoulders. The way you held my hand like I was something precious. Soft forehead kisses. Taking candid pictures of me when I wasn’t looking because you claimed I looked “prettier natural.” The princess treatment. God, you were good at it. You felt like every romantic movie I had ever watched mixed into one person. And maybe that was the first red flag. Nobody should feel that unreal. You fell first. But unfortunately for me, I fell harder. At first, I thought your emotional distance was stress. You were older, busier, experienced. I excused everything. The dry replies. The disappearing acts. The random coldness after days of affection. Every time I got tired and started pulling away, you came back sweeter than before calling me dramatic, pulling me into long hugs, speaking in that soft voice that could convince rain not to fall. And I believed you. Not because your lies were flawless, but because innocence makes dishonesty harder to imagine. Then came that walk. You took pictures of me that evening. I remember feeling so pretty beside you. We laughed, talked about life, future plans, random nonsense. The night air was cold, but your hand around mine felt warm enough to trust. It should have remained one of my favorite memories. Instead, it became the exact moment my perception of love changed forever. By complete accident, I opened a conversation I was never supposed to see. And there it was. Not just infedelity no, that word feels too ordinary for what I saw. It was calculated deception. Parallel affection. Carefully distributed intimacy. A performance so polished I almost wanted to applaud you for maintaining it so effortlessly. A different girl. Different promises. Same recycled lines. The same compliments that once made my stomach flutter were copy-and-pasted confessions handed out like flyers. I remember my chest tightening so hard I genuinely thought I would throw up. My head felt heavy. My hands shook. And the craziest part? You looked at me so calmly when I confronted you. Almost too calmly. Like this was just another inconvenience you could smooth over with charm. That was the night something inside me died quietly. The soft girl you met never fully returned after that. I picked up my pride, what little remained of it, and left. A month passed, and heartbreak slowly soured into resentment. Especially after my friend saw you taking another girl out on the kind of proper date you never once took me on. Funny, isn’t it? How the bare minimum feels luxurious when you’re in love with potential instead of reality. And then I saw you again today. You looked breathtaking. I hate that part. Hate how my eyes still noticed the details immediately. The laugh. The posture. The confidence. Even from a distance, you still carried that same magnetic aura that once ruined my common sense. Then our eyes locked. And for one dangerous second, everything around me blurred into silence. It felt like slow motion. Like my heart temporarily forgot every sleepless night, every tear-filled prayer, every embarrassing moment I spent trying to understand why I was never enough for someone who never deserved me in the first place. But then reality returned. And I realized something almost poetic. I never actually missed you. I missed the version of you that never existed. The carefully crafted illusion. The character you performed so well I mistook it for authenticity. Maybe the “19th love theory” wasn’t a joke after all. Maybe some people arrive in your life beautifully packaged just to teach you discernment. To teach you that attraction and intention are not the same thing. That some men know exactly how to imitate love without ever truly feeling it. And sometimes experience really is the most merciless teacher of all. Still… Thank you. Because the girl who met you would have accepted anything in the name of love. The girl writing this never will again. NEXT.

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