The Boy I Once Knew

To the boy, I once knew,

I hope you are reading this letter, although the chances of it are very few. I will not send this to you because I never really want you to know what I felt for you during the months we spent together. As much as I always like to express my love to people close to me, I won’t do that for you. I won’t. I don’t know what is stopping me from just pressing the enter button, and whoosh, it will go to the email. Maybe it is the fact that you never show, or maybe it is that I never tell. It is a mystery and a paradox in my head; it keeps looping from one loop to another.

I saw your photograph before I saw you, and damn, you were beautiful. But that was just it. I liked your smile, and I moved on until the day when you were sitting right before me, with a cigarette between your fingers. My friends were there with you, on those stairs we always sat on. You were even gorgeous in person, I’ll give you that. I don’t know if it is right to call you my friend because I don’t know if we ever were friends, to begin with. I still don’t know. All I know is that you are there when someone needs you, maybe not in the ways they wanted you to be, but you are always there, hand in hand.

But, the boy I once saw in you is no more. You haven’t changed a bit, but everything else has. Seeing you smile gives me hope; it helps me keep going. But it all seems to be a thing of the past that happened long ago. You do not smile the same anymore. Maybe you smile better, or maybe you do not smile at all. Your eyes used to light up every time you would see someone. Nowadays, it is more like you are tired. You are tired of something but won’t let anybody close to that, not even yourself.

I know people come and go, but I never wanted you to go or to stay. But, there are some people you meet someday, and you keep seeing them every day until the day they drift apart, just like that. No warnings. No disclaimers.

For what it is worth, I will remember you as the boy I once knew. The shortest story has been written in the history of my life. But, before I go, I want to say a few things to you that I may not be able to say out loud to you or anybody else. I will miss you. I already miss you. I will miss every time you call out my name like nobody else did. Who will call me that?

You were my guardian angel. You sit at the same spot I saw you at every day. I pass by you, and we wave hello and goodbyes to each other. You do not smile anymore, and I do not smile back. I am happy that you were a part of me and my life. Do not lose yourself or others around you; what you all have is precious enough to keep for a lifetime.

Stay happy kid

Yours

Shallu Jaglan