Perfectly Right and Completely Fake

Dear Maddy,

I loved you.

Maybe I shouldn't have. After all everyone said we were wrong. Everyone said we wouldn't make it. Everyone said you were a cheat, a faker, that you had a reputation.

But I guess I believed in us. I wanted to believe. I wanted to think what we had was real, that all those smiles and I love yous were true. I wanted to believe that true love exists, that this is our happily ever after.

Everyone was right. Apparently some reputations aren't so easily ignored. The signs were there. I refused to accept it. I always thought it was beyond you. Even as you walked away, telling me I was naive, I wanted it to be a lie. I wanted us to work it out. I believed we could.

Sometimes I wonder if you even cared. What was fake, what was real? Did you ever feel anything for me? Was he really everything you wanted? Are you happy now, after you managed to get rid of me?

I remember that night at the bar, that drunken night when I looked at you in the eyes and told you I loved you and you smiled and repeated it. The signs were there. You dodged my eyes, looked down, avoided my gaze.

I remember the night we were making love. You were lying on the bed with me above you. I kissed your collarbones, your thin stomach. Your blue eyes so wide and innocent, colors bursting in a beautiful pinwheel. The way you panted, breaths becoming quick and heavy, how beautiful you looked that night.

For me that night was perfect, every thing I could ever want and so much more. I wanted us to be happy together. The thought that there was someone else never even occurred to me. I trusted you, I truly thought you were my one and only.

Sometimes I remember our bad times, the times when you didn't even want to look at me, when you'd text nonstop, without telling me who it was, the nights when you'd come back later than ever, blaming it on you job.

If I had looked close enough, it was obvious. I was blind, too trusting, too believing. Maybe if I had noticed earlier, talked to you, it wouldn't have happened.

That awful night. Maybe for some it was just another couple fight, happens all the time. I remember how hateful, how vindictive, how harmful you looked. The way you yelled still haunts me, as does the angry look in your eyes, full of hate. You simply stated it, as if it was just another fact about the weather. "I never loved you. I'm not saying this because I'm angry. This is a fact."

You looked at me in the eyes, blue meeting brown. You seemed so proud, so gleeful at the thought of hurting me as you announced that you were in a relationship with another man, that you just stayed with me for a joke, because you wanted to see how long it took for me to realize you don't love me. I guess I surprised you. You said you thought we could last for 2 months maximum. We were together for a year and a half. A year and a half of lies, of cheating, of fake smiles. A year and a half that I thought was love. How can you love him truly after faking for a year and a half with me?

I'm happy now, I have my boyfriend who loves me. I bet you didn't expect for me to be bi. We love each other. We have a serious life, a grown up life. We're going to adopt, going to raise a family.

Sometimes I still can't help but wonder what happened with us, what would have happened with us. We were young, we were wild. Parties, drugs, alcohol, were our friends. We were immortal, forever young. We were the young adult Peter Pans, looking for our own little perfect Neverland, a place where we'd never grow up. I thought we shared those dreams, wanted to be young together forever.

And maybe after it all, this was the right choice, maybe this was what was supposed to happen. But maybe I still miss you. Maybe after it all I still love you. Time moves on. It doesn't stop for the hopeless dreamers, for the ones who missed their chance. I guess in the end, what I feel now doesn't matter. But I want you to know, after it all, I'm ready to give us another chance, to meet real you, the one who doesn't fake.

Yours truly,
Connor