I thought love sounded like

late-night calls

that stretched until sleep

stole our voices.

I thought it lived

inside every “I love you,”

every text that lit up my screen

like a promise

the dark could never swallow.

I mistook consistency

for forever,

attention

for devotion,

and hope

for truth.

I was busy

building a home

from your words,

while you were only

passing through.

You were the book—

complete,

bound,

destined to continue

long after I was gone.

I was only a chapter.

A few pages

you lingered on,

until the story

asked for someone else.

I stayed,

thinking I’d make it

to the ending.

You closed the cover

without looking back.

Now I reread

every memory,

searching for the place

where love ended

and convenience began.

Maybe it was always written

between the lines—

that I was never

your forever.

Just a page

you folded,

a chapter

you finished,

a name

the next story

would never mention.

And somehow,

the cruelest part isn’t

that you left.

It’s that I loved you

like the ending of my story,

while to you,

I was only

a paragraph

you’d already forgotten