The first time he smiled, it made my heart flutter a little bit.
I knew I caused that smile and I wanted to keep that feeling forever.
I was sitting on my bedroom floor and I knew where things were going.
I knew things where coming to an end.
I could feel it in my pulse.
It was quick.
Too quick.
In a split second, everything shattered.
My heart.
But also everything else around me.
The first time he smiled, I wanted to take a picture of it to remind me that we were truly happy once.
After all these years, things had to change as much as we did.
I was not that stupid-lovestruck-sixteen-year-old anymore.
I was a twenty year old woman with dreams and a lot of ambition.
But he smiled and once again, I was torn apart by the tornado that he was.
He was such a good one, though.
He made me feel perfect.
He made me feel as if I was worthy of love.
And I realized that I was.
But I couldn’t find myself anymore.
He defined me.
He put a sticker on me and put me in a box.
I did not know if I could be anything else than his love, his heart.
He is the first boy I have ever loved.
You can’t get rid of that.
Our love was not photographs that can be torn apart.
It was kisses and hugs and hand-holding and cups of coffee at 11pm just because we love the taste.
It was movie nights and pop-corn and tasted like his favorite cheese-cake.
Our love was beautiful.
But beautiful hurts sometimes.
Beautiful does not make everything right.
We loved wrong.
We loved too much and held on to each other.
I call our love ephemeral.
Like my favorite word on the planet.
Our love was as lovely as a sunrise that only lasts for a moment, but takes our breath away.
Everything comes and goes.
I chose to let go.
Just because we love someone doesn’t mean that everything is perfect.
Sometimes we need to love them from a distance.
We need to let go and see where life takes us.
Our love lasted for a long time.
And it still does.
I still love him.
Because that’s what we do with first loves.
We love them forever.
I gave him the power to destroy me.
And he didn’t.
Because that is who he is.
I was sitting on my bedroom floor and I knew where things were going.
I looked at him.
He smiled and said: « Don’t worry about me. I’ll keep you right here. »
And that was it.
No Taylor Swift song can make this better.
And it doesn’t have to be.
We chose to let go.
Because sometimes, holding on hurts even more.
-Excerpt from a book I’ll never write
