I have just realized something important about the way I used to look at you. when you decided to confess, when you told me you could no longer pretend that this was only a friendship, you left me with a choice. whether I see you as a friend, or as something more than that.

Yes, I was anxious. I freaked out. I felt as if this was the end of something. yet, for some reason, choosing you as a friend never felt possible to me at all. because it never truly was, not from the beginning.

I have lived this exact moment with other girls before. I was anxious then too, but for a different reason. I was afraid of losing them as friends, or as colleagues, because that was all I wanted them to be in my life. I did not love them. they deserved love, they were good, but I saw them clearly as friends, nothing more.

What I understand now is this. when I avoid someone, it is usually because they are trying to fall for me and I do not want them. almost every girl I met fit into that pattern. or because they are someone I could never keep as just a friend. and that was you.

From the start, I can see it more clearly than ever. I did not want to see you as a friend. I wanted something more. and if I ever tried to imagine you as a friend, the image that appeared was worse. it was a world where you and I were strangers. a world where we did not know each other deeply. and that image hurts me. as if we were never meant to be strangers at all.

So it was not an exception that I ran from you or avoided you. I was not satisfied with keeping you as a friend. I am not saying this as a compliment or a fantasy. truly, I never imagined you as only a friend. I could not find that version of us in my head.

Now, when I look back, I remember moments more clearly. all the times I told you things like “you deserve much better” or “you are stronger than me.” they were not empty words. they carried a signal I did not know how to say directly. that you deserved to be here with me. not as something temporary. not as just friends.