Month: July 2007

He always looked forward to seeing her. They had such a rapport and could talk about all sorts for hours, their mates would tease them afterwards ‘We couldn’t get a word in’ they would laugh, ‘we may as well have not been at the pub’. He wasn’t sure what kind of crazy glue formed this bond between them, but he knew he liked it. Years later, after they have gone their separate ways he will convince himself that he was right not to tell her how he really felt about her. She was bright with university and a big future ahead of her, he was still living in the town that he had grown up in, in the same job he’d had for years, how could he hold her back? One day, when chance throws them together at a wedding, he sees her walking towards him and all those feelings that he’d masked for years come crashing back like a deluge. ‘You know, I had such a huge crush on you back then,’ she confides in him, eyes sparkling just like they used to. And just like that, the remorse and reality come tumbling about him as he understands that now, with his life, his obligations, this can never be, that back then, with her, he had the chance to be really happy and he let it slip away.

I’ve never really known your side of the story. A year after we split up your best mate told me that you were so proud of our friendship, that it meant the world to you. Hearing that was enough to keep me hanging on to the feeble line I’d been thrown, clinging desperately like a ship wreck survivor. I suffered a million heart breaks every time I saw you. I wanted to cut and run and be free of the pain, to finally shake off the tiny shards that kept digging into me. Yet something kept me hanging on. And I came out of the tempest and never looked back. But every now and then I come to an impasse and I wonder why I went through what I did on the word of someone I didn’t even know that well. So I ask you and you tell me that I should know how important this friendship is, how much I mean to you. But how would I ever know when you never tell me why?