Dear Stranger

Dear Stranger,

I can't believe I never saw it. I never saw you didn't care, and I beat myself up because I never noticed how little I meant to you. You can't tell me I'm wrong though, because how can someone go from being my closest confidant to never talking to me again in the span of a day. During the most challenging time of my life, you couldn't relate to my feelings, so you shut them down. You gaslighted me to no end, and you made me feel insignificant. All I wanted was a shoulder to cry on. Instead, I lost you forever.

We knew it had to have been coming in a triangle of friends; two of the three will always be closer to each other in the end. That's exactly what happened and it happened more than once. First, you tried to help me figure out the right decision in a tough scenario but made a bad situation for a friend worse by bringing it up with her family, forcing me to choose between the one person who needed me and the one who was only trying to help. Later, when your boyfriend tried

to ask to see me naked, you got mad at me because "why was he talking to you anyway?" Nothing could ever be his fault with you. You wanted me to hate every boyfriend you had. I don't know why, but you made that abundantly clear. So when the guy you dated for a single week in eighth grade reached out to me and wanted to go on a few dates once we were adults, I somehow broke some sacred rule in your book. And it didn't matter when our friend would bring her boyfriend on double dates with you and yours, but it was so bizarre when I wanted to be included too. Yet when our friend and I hung out exclusively, you got mad at us. But being mad or resentful wasn't the role you planned out for me in our friendship, was it? She didn't care because one of us was always going to choose her. And I tried so hard, but in the end we both lost her I guess. I was always the shy submissive one that you both could push any which way. Without me, you guys didn't have someone to do your bidding.

But none of this is why we ended, is it? No, it's because you let a source that you yourself didn't trust put words in my mouth. She told you that I didn't think you were a good friend -among other things, but the world doesn't need to know the daggers you dug into me that night. Regardless, you took her twisted words and held them so hard I am surprised they're not tattooed on your hands. I tried to salvage what was left but you left me in the cold and never turned around. It's sad that you've never reached out, but neither have I. It's not my fault my dreams didn't line up with your storyline. I had to write my own story, and that story couldn't include you. Not if I wanted to grow, and I have grown. But you don't get to see that, and you don't get to be a part of it because my life began the moment I realized I wasn't here to please you. You left a gash in my heart for so long. The beauty is that although it hurt, those cuts turn to scars, and scars do heal no matter how deep.