She Will Never Know.

I miss being able to talk to you about anything. I used to be able to say absolutely anything at all to you. You would listen. You wouln't worry. You wouldn't be offended, scared, anything. Now I'm afraid to even ask how you feel for me.

You used to love me.

It was so easy to tell. You would stay up far too late on nights that preceeded early mornings just to talk to me. For hours, we would just talk. It didn't matter what about. It mattered that you and I wanted to talk to one another bad enough that we would be sleep-deprived zombies the following day just to be in contact. To have any form of contact with one another, we would do whatever we had to.

God, it was so mutal.

So many memories with you stand out like a campfire in the desert that is my life. In the short year that you have entered and begun to leave my world, I have lived more than in the other 18 years combined.

Like the night when my best friends who'd come up to visit from MMI in Arizona had to go back. I was devastated. I'd missed them more than I knew I could miss someone. They were true friends, brothers. They still are and will always be, long after you and I have gone our separate ways. If we do. You're still unsure, aren't you?

That night, after I'd dropped off my closest friend and said goodbye, when I got the text message from you saying I could come over, I was lost. I was empty. I was driving too fast in the dark, with my music too loud, hoping to god that I would find something at your house. I walked up to the tall wooden gate around your backyard and knocked.

Nobody answered. I called 'hello?' quietly a few times.

Then I got another text. "I can see you."

I smiled. You were never boring. There was always something unexpected, even little things like that You never acted predicatbly. Looking back, I can see that it is just one of the things about you that makes you so very rare. Little things.

"Then open the damn door," I demanded in fake anger. The gate creaked open.

And there you were, looking somewhat shy but excited at the same time. You were inexperienced then. I know. I think I may have been a novelty to you. I'm still not sure.

There were candles lit all over the back porch.

Who does that, in these times? What girl will go to the trouble to light candles and set them all around the deck just for...me? Most girls act as though I should constantly be serving them. As though I am somehow not worthy of their presence and must do favors to earn it. Most girls act this way. You never did. You do now, maybe without even realizing it.

I took your hand and kissed you without even saying hello. I kissed you for a long time. I was still lost, but I had you. I knew it then. I'd said goodbye to my best friend 20 minutes ago. Without you, I would have driven home and sat alone, letting the darkness creep in one me. Maybe I would have gotten stoned, sunk myself further into oblivion. I used to get stoned all the time. I never had the slightest inclination towards any sort of oblivion when you and I were together. I wanted to be where I was, wanted to exist, with a deep, primal, passion. You made the time worthwhile. When I was with you, I felt so damned alive. It wasn't because you were just some girl to fool around with. I think you may still belive I felt that way and feel that way.

Girl. You could not be more mistaken.

It was the fact that I was with you. You... are hard to describe. It's something about how very, very open you were with me. You held nothing back. We could talk about anything and everything and more. We could laugh over the deepest troubles. We could make each other happy. Without thought or effort. It just...happened. I never, ever, had to try with you. There are so very few people that I can just... be... with. My best friends, who are now out of state. My brother. You.

Occasionally my parents.

You were one of 'them,' the people I could be myself with. You were one of the people I could relax completely around. I didn't have to watch what I said. I just said what I felt with you.

But you were so different from 'them.'

You were fiery. You knew what you wanted. You were independent; to this day, you are the most independent girl I've ever known. Most girls call their boyfriends every day. Often many times a day. Most girls I know have big problems often. Most girls seem to have problems handling life.

I'm not being sexist. I have problems handling life too. I know you do, too.

But you had some inexplicable inner fortitude. Nothing ever became too much for you in the way it did for others. Something about your upbringing, your basic nature, or your experiences has given you the ability to stay strong and not rely on others for anything.

It meant so much more to me to get your calls, knowing this. To know that you did NOT need me. You didn't rely on me for everything. You just... wanted me in your life. You saw something of value in me. I don't know what it was. Maybe I read you wrong. Maybe I was just the first guy you have ever kissed, and you thought it was fun. I hate to talk that way. That is not... 'you.' Not the you that I know. You are never false or fake or deceitful. You never play games. But maybe your emotions and your hormones ran away from you. Maybe it was just the fact that I was a male who liked you.

I may never know.

I only know that you meant so much to me, such a short time ago. I cared about you in a way that I have never cared for another. You brought out new feelings in me, a protectiveness I had never felt before, a desire to please you in every way I could, a desire to wake up with you in the mornings. Love... we called it love. I would say, "I love you." Then you would say, "I love you too."

Maybe we were both lying.

There is no definition for love. No one can say exactly what love is without a doubt. Maybe this was just infatuation. Young lust.

Maybe neither of us will ever know.

But something has happened. You don't know any more. You're confused.

You still want to be with me, you say. You still care for me, deeply, but how do you know, you ask, if you love me?

I wish there was a little red light that would come on when you were in love. Like a check engine light. Maybe I'd have my arms wrapped around you, my lips pressed to yours, and a little light would flash in your brain and you would know. Wouldn't that be nice? To be absolutely sure?

Now we are in love's purgatory. We wait. We hope the light will blink. Or that it will become clear that you no longer love me. I sit and wonder, but I no longer ask, because I know you still don't know.

The cruelty of love is apparent in the fact that one of us still knows.

I still want to be with you. I still love you. I drive this from my mind with any device that presents itself. I stay as distracted as I possibly can to avoid it. I don't want to love you if you don't love me. I don't. I don't want to feel this way if it will not be reciprocated. What is unrequited love but another term for hopelessness? I always had hope, before. Now, I am not sure I do.

What will I do if I can never stop feeling like this? What the hell am I supposed to do with myself now? I KNOW I still feel this way. I can only hide it so deep inside me before it claws its way to the surface again. It's still there. I can't ignore it forever. I can't keep trying to talk to you like you're nothing more than a friend to me. You're so much more.

And I can't tell you, because I don't want you to feel guilty. I don't want you to be guilted into love. It wouldn't be love. It would be hell for you, knowing that you felt differently but couldn't say anything for fear of hurting me. It would put you where I am now, and I would much rather endure this. That must be another sick trait of love. I love you enough that I could never hurt you in any way. I can't. I can't make myself tell you what I feel.

If you decide that you don't love me anymore, I will never tell you how I feel. If you fall for somebody else, I will pretend not to care anymore, so that you might be happy as I die within and hope I can be reborn. I think maybe I could. Maybe after enough time passed by, the wound would scab over. Maybe I'd meet someone else that would be something like you. Maybe you're not the only one for me.

I can't explain it to you. For now, all I can do is wait and act like everything is okay so that everything WILL be okay for you. Even if every day feels like a year, I will just have to wait.

I was never patient.

But I will be patient for you. Take your time. Figure it out. Then put an end to what we had or breathe life into it again. Either would be better than this uncertainty. To know that everything I'd feared has happened would be a release. I could move on. I could try to start again.

If you somehow come back to me, maybe it can be half as good as it was. Maybe one day, we will even get back to where we were. Maybe you will feel like my other half again. It used to be like that. Whenever you left, I felt as if half of me had left with you.

I'm half the man I used to be. Please make me whole or allow me to disintegrate.

It won't kill me. I will grieve; I can't deny that. It's my nature. If something bad happens to me, I don't paint it in rainbows and laugh it off. I accept it and let myself admit that I am sad. I'm only human.

But I will always have some way to feel alive. I can always lose myself in the dirt and metal and air of motocross. I can always drive to the mountain and disappear into the clean, white world of snowboarding. I can always go upriver and drink myself into congeniality with a dozen strangers. I can always pursue other girls and hope that I'll feel something for them.

I wish I could tell you what you meant to me. What you mean to me. How very important you are to me.

I wish I didn't have to tell you. I wish you would believe me when I told you I missed you. That's all I can tell you without fear anymore. Is it so hard to believe that I feel how I do?

Do you think I'm some horny teenager trying to get into your pants?

Do you think I'm a two-faced hypocrite?

Do you think I've been lying? That I am false? Do you think that I must be confused? That I have been deceived by my own feelings?

I KNOW what I feel. It is powerful enough that I do not have to question. The slow burn in my chest as I write this is enough. I've never felt that burn for anyone or anything but you.

I miss you. More than I can explain. And I will never be able to explain.

You will never see this.