I suppose honesty is what brought me to this point, so that’s how I’ll start. My life was a series of neatly arranged boxes, each labeled and stored on a shelf to be accessed or forgotten as needed. There was the box for family gatherings, the one for work achievements, another for solitary evenings with just a book and the noise of a bustling street below my window. But within these boxes was a secret I hardly knew I was keeping, a part of me that was just pretending, until we couldn’t anymore, and we never quite recovered.
It was winter when I first met Alex. Snow dusted the pavement like sugar on a forgotten cake, and I was drawn to their laughter, loud and unapologetic amidst the grayness of the city. We became a duo, harmonizing in laughter and whispers, creating a world for ourselves amidst the noise. At first, it was all friendship, uncomplicated and blissful. We navigated bars and bookstores, cooked meals that were always slightly burnt but tasted perfect with a shared bottle of wine. My favorite memories are those nameless hours spent in each other’s company, hearts wide open in discussions that threaded from the mundane to the arcane.
But hiding among those perfect days was something else. I suppose I used those days as camouflage, love disguised as friendship. I didn’t realize how deep everything went until it was too late. I never gave voice to what stirred underneath the surface; maybe I thought if I ignored it, the feelings would vanish like scribbles washed away by rain. How often do we hold onto something so tightly because we fear the storm we might unleash if we let go?
Life, as it is wont to do, tangled our paths further. Alex met someone. Their eyes gleamed with the joy of a newfound love, and I was happy for them, genuinely. Happiness, though, is not immune to complexity. There were mornings when my coffee tasted slightly more bitter, afternoons where everything seemed colder despite the sun. I attributed my unease to change, something we’d always laughed about as an inevitable knot in life’s grand tapestry.
Then the invitations began. Alex was including me, stitching me into the fabric of new beginnings with their partner. I accepted, because what else can you do when you’re torn between wanting to be part of someone’s life and the pull of self-preservation? I played my role, and perhaps too well—chatting, laughing, pretending that being the third wheel didn’t bend my heart into strange and uncomfortable shapes.
Strangely, this pretending worked for a while, like a worn-out coat that still kept the rain off. My life continued in its steadiness, categorized and neutral, punctuated with obligatory reunions where laughter always felt an inch away from unraveling. It was a life built on half-truths, sandcastles waiting for the tide.
The unraveling began subtly. A misplaced glance, an accidental brush of hands, silences that spoke volumes when words failed. All the signs were there, lingering in the spaces between jokes and shared meals. I should have known then that the pretenses could only stretch so far before snapping back with the force of things unsaid.
An argument, or perhaps a fight, marked the pivot. Surprising right? It wasn’t something grand, but a seed of discontent that had taken root, now shooting forth between the facades we carried. I think it happened because truths did surface; truths that no longer fit within the confines of those boxes I had so meticulously tended. Alex accused me of being distant, of holding back, while I hesitated, caught between admission and denial. Suddenly, everything felt raw, like walking barefoot over jagged stones.
I finally let go of the act—no more pretending. I hadn’t planned on confessing anything, nor had I imagined how things might crumble once I did. I admitted what had become painfully clear: that shadows I had cast as figments were musings on love I couldn’t quite speak of, for fear of the inevitable consequence. Maybe I hoped for redemption, something that could stave off the guilt of withholding the truth for so long.
But if life had taught me anything, it’s that truths once revealed, whether asked for or not, have their own gravity. We never recovered; not fully at least. The bridge of laughter and companionship lay somewhere between burnt ends and new beginnings. Maybe we both grieved the simplicity we once had, where friendship bore no hidden creases of a love unspoken, unacknowledged but always felt.
I learned to live with these remnants. Alex remains in the periphery now, no longer center stage. We exchanged polite texts sometimes, congratulations on anniversaries, best wishes for birthdays. But behind every message hides a yearning for something irretrievable. These small exchanges are tokens of a time when things were simpler, almost like memorabilia from a place that once felt like home.
Experiences change us, mold our hearts into configurations that perhaps weren’t visible before. What remains is the awareness that love, when stifled, can morph into a ghost that haunts the corridors of memory with regrets illuminated under the harsh light of hindsight. I learned, the hard way, that pretending is a fragile shield pressed against the weight of truth, bound to crack under pressure. The journey through this maze of reflection reminds me to cherish clarity while embracing whatever storm may come.
