I really thought it was you. I don’t know how else to explain it. Out of everyone I could have met in this life, I really believed you were the person I was supposed to find. You weren’t just someone I loved. You felt like my person, my other half, my best friend, my home. Being with you made me feel like I had finally found someone who understood me in a way I had always wanted to be understood. I never thought I would have to figure out what my life looked like without you because, in my mind, you were always going to be there.

I pictured so much with you. Not even just the big things. I pictured the normal stuff. Coming home to you, telling you about my day, annoying each other, laughing over stupid things that nobody else would find funny, figuring life out as we went. I pictured us getting older and looking back at everything we went through together. Whenever I thought about my future, I didn’t have to force you into it. You were already there. It felt natural to believe that whatever happened in life, at least I would have you beside me.

That’s probably why losing you has hurt me in a way I don’t know how to put into words. I lost everything I thought we were going to become. I lost a future that felt so real to me even though we never got to live it. There are memories I thought we would make that no longer exist. Places I thought we’d go, things I thought we’d experience together, versions of ourselves I thought we’d eventually get to meet.

I think that’s the part I’m scared I’ll never fully get over. People say that eventually you move on, and maybe I will. I’m sure I’ll laugh again. I’ll make new memories. I’ll have good days where you don’t cross my mind at all. Life isn’t going to stop just because we did. But I don’t know if there will ever be a version of me that can look back at losing you and feel nothing. I don’t know if I’m supposed to.

Because I loved you so deeply, I loved you in that stupid, vulnerable way where I genuinely believed that no matter how difficult things got, somehow we’d find our way back to each other. I thought what we had was stronger than what was hurting us. I thought love would be enough to keep choosing each other. Maybe that was naive, but it was real to me. I wasn’t pretending when I imagined forever with you. I meant it.

There are days when I’m okay, and then there are days when something small reminds me of you, and suddenly it feels fresh again. A song, a place, a memory, a stupid little thing I know you would’ve laughed at. Sometimes I still instinctively think about telling you something, only to remember that you’re not that person for me anymore.

I think a part of me will always wonder what would’ve happened if we had gotten it right. Suppose we had understood each other a little better, if we had been more patient, if we had known then what we know now. I know there’s no point living inside all those what ifs, but sometimes I can’t help it. When you genuinely thought someone was going to be beside you for the rest of your life, it’s hard not to wonder about the life you almost had.

Maybe one day I’ll understand why you came into my life if you weren’t meant to stay in it. Right now, I don’t. Right now, I’m still trying to understand how someone can feel so much like your soulmate and still become someone you have to learn to live without.

And I think that’s what hurts the most.