Seeing him with her affected me way worse than I thought it would.
And I hate even admitting that because I really thought I had a better grip on this situation emotionally. I knew what this was between us. I knew we weren’t together. I knew there were other women. None of that was hidden from me. So in my head, I thought I prepared myself enough to handle something like this if it ever happened.
But actually seeing it is different.
Actually seeing him beside somebody else after everything between us felt like reality finally hitting me all at once. And ever since then, my head has just been nonstop. Thinking about everything. Replaying everything. Overanalyzing everything.
Because no matter how much I try to reduce this connection down to “it was just sex,” it never fully felt like just sex to me.
Not all the time.
There was too much emotional familiarity there.
Too much softness in certain moments.
Too much reassurance for there to be absolutely nothing underneath it.
That’s what keeps getting to me.
Because why reassure me at all if I was supposed to feel nothing? Why go out of your way to tell me the girls around you weren’t serious? Why reassure me more than once that you weren’t in a relationship? Why keep circling back to me every time logic told us to stop this?
That’s what makes this hurt in such a confusing way.
Because logically, I know exactly what this was.
But emotionally, it became more than that to me over time.
And our dynamic really was one of a kind.
A year and a half of constantly trying to leave each other alone and somehow always finding our way back. I know he stayed because I allowed him to. I’m not delusional about that. I opened the door for him just as much as he opened the door back for me. Every time I tried to end it, somehow I’d come back. Every time he pulled away, somehow he’d come back too.
That’s what keeps messing with my head now.
Because if something is truly that toxic to somebody, wouldn’t they leave it alone completely? Wouldn’t they stop returning to it? We both knew this wasn’t healthy. We both said it over and over again. We both knew this dynamic drained us mentally. Yet neither one of us fully let go for a year and a half.
That’s not normal casual behavior to me.
That’s the kind of shit that keeps me up overthinking now because I start wondering what this actually was to him emotionally. Was it deeper than he allowed himself to admit? Or was I the only one attaching meaning to all of it? Was I the only one carrying this connection heavier than it was supposed to be carried?
Because you don’t stay in something that long accidentally.
You don’t keep returning to the same person accidentally.
You don’t continuously choose somebody over and over again for a year and a half if there’s absolutely nothing there.
At least that’s what my mind keeps trying to convince itself of lately.
And maybe that’s why seeing him with her got under my skin the way it did. Because suddenly I’m forced to sit with the reality that maybe everything I thought felt significant between us was only significant to me in the way I experienced it.
That thought hurts more than seeing him with somebody else honestly.
Because I can handle us not being together. I always knew we weren’t together. But feeling like something consumed me emotionally more than it consumed him? That’s the part that’s harder to swallow.
And maybe I’ll never fully know the truth of what I meant to him.
Maybe he doesn’t even fully know himself.
I just know seeing him with her made everything feel a lot less numb.
Tag: moving on
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He is the last connection from last summer that I haven’t fully let go of yet. I can feel it. Not dramatically, but in the quiet moments when my mind slows down and there’s nothing else to focus on. That’s when he shows up again, like a memory that never really packed up and left.
For months it was easy between us. Comfortable. No pressure, no expectations, just time spent together and the understanding that it was what it was. I didn’t push for more, and he didn’t offer it. We stayed right there in the middle, and I was okay living in that space.
But the last time I saw him, something about it felt different. The way he touched me felt more intentional, more present, like he wanted to hold onto the moment a little longer than usual. Not enough to change anything, not enough to promise anything, just enough to make me feel it deeper than I expected to.
I can almost feel his side of it too. Like he’s living in the moment, taking what feels good, keeping it simple, not trying to build something bigger than what he’s ready for. Staying where it’s comfortable. Staying where there’s no pressure to give more than he wants to give.
And I get that. I really do.
Still, sometimes I catch myself wanting him in a way that feels stronger than it should. Missing him. Thinking about him. Wondering what it would feel like if things were different, even though I already know they’re not. I try to push the thoughts away, fill my time with other things, keep myself busy so I don’t sit in it too long.
But when the house is quiet again, when everything settles, those thoughts come back like they were just waiting for their turn.
He’s the last one.
The last connection from last summer.
The last piece still hanging on.And I can feel myself slowly loosening my grip on it, even on the days when I miss him the most.
trailofchapters 