Meaningless

 It passes through my mind every so often. 

The day I didn't respond to a text after leaving my phone in my room. Coming back to it to find it filled with multiple messages saying you missed me, where was I, I better not be with some other girl. 

All of it, every last one, should have been a red flag. Sadly, as someone who often felt unseen, unheard, and unwanted, I registered it differently. 

To me, it was the first time anyone had ever expressed that they wanted me all to themselves. When you are starved for emotional care, it's easy to fall into that. I wasn't experienced or mature enough to recognize it was just a little game you played for attention. 

Still, that is the moment I think my heart uncapped. I had always been the afterthought, the "oh, I guess since no one else is around" person. I thought you were different. 

I thought you wanted me. I thought when you looked at me, you were getting as lost in my eyes as I was in yours. I thought when we kissed, you also felt like your heart was going to burst out of your chest. Like your heart was burning so badly for me that you could see the bright white heat of it when you closed your eyes. 

I thought you felt safe with me.

I thought I could be safe with you. I thought I could finally breathe. I thought I had found someone who wanted to keep me safe. 

I was wrong.

It was just a game. The same game you played a million times with the boyfriends you had before and after me. 

I'll pretend to care, and you do the same; whoever feels something real first loses.

You talked a lot and said nothing. I talked a lot and said everything.

Years later, we danced again.

You talked a lot and said nothing. 

This time, I read the room and left when I knew I wasn't wanted.

Almost half a year passed, and you tried again. What you were trying remains unclear, as it likely always will be. 

Clumsy ill timed half half-hearted attempts to reconnect. To a past you wanted to disappear and forget. To a person who never received consideration, whom you deemed "pathetic" and "weird". To a person you've only ever viewed as an extension of yourself. 

Pretending to make assumptions about my life, hoping I will divulge something beyond a social media post.

Pretending to care but never asking how I'm doing or how my life has been.

Making me a dumping ground for complaints on cell service, relationship epiphanies, and a loss of memories that you can dispute despite not remembering anything.            

Then I remember that I'm writing to the wind, and none of this will mean anything. Because nothing ever has.