i just wanted to feel some sort of goodbye. some sort of closure one way or the other. but instead, everything just got thrown all over the place and i was just stuck there, sifting through all those memories; trying to gather up all those words. all those something’s. and i didn’t know how to say goodbye to them. how to feel sad or angry about them, or how to feel anything at all.

i fell in love with those summer nights, the way we’d talk for hours over pitchers of beer and get lost somewhere between breaths of cigarette smoke and our own laughs. the way you stopped mid-sentence to reach over and steal a kiss, forgetting words and smiling at the taste of my lips on yours. those nights had a way of wrapping us up, making us forget that the rest of the world was still moving.

and in the morning i fell in love with tangled sheets; our tangled limbs. your warm chest and my cold feet. the way you begged for five more minutes before having to get out of bed. the way those five minutes turned into thirty.

and that same morning i fell in love with the taco shop around the corner. how you always ordered the same tacos, a side of rice and beans, and how you flirted with the waitress then grabbed my hand to kiss it. “you’re so beautiful,” you’d say.

the walk down the alley back to your car made me remember to stop and feel the sun on my skin, to feel alive, to feel the way your eyes studied the curves of my body. the way they drank up my smile and found my soul.

and somewhere in between falling in love with our midnight conversations in the dark and all the little love notes you left written on my flesh, i realized i was in love with the way your words danced on the end of mine, and i was in love with the feel of your existence.

but i was not in love with you.