10 days from now, a year ago, it began.
You started following me. Everywhere I existed on social media. You were in the streams, in voice chats when we watched movies. You wrote, you were present, you became a big part of the community.
15 days from now, a year ago, you became the most important part of my life.
You carried me through so many crises. You tried to lift me up, to help me, and you believed in me.
You told me you loved me.
I told you I loved you.
And it felt honest. It felt real.
We always said that this connection—this pull toward each other—was something neither of us had ever felt before.
We were certain it would last forever.
And now, the closer these days come again, the more I cry.
The angrier I become with myself.
I am sitting here, quite literally using every bit of emotional strength I have to hold on to the hope you once told me never to give up.
To the promise that no matter what happens, you would never stop loving me.
There was an “us.”
There was a future.
You stayed, even when I was so often unkind.
And now, as everything is changing, you’re not here.
You don’t see what’s happening to me.
You don’t see or feel the tears, the hope, the love that is still here.
I don’t know whether you—wonderful as you are—might already have someone else.
But even if you did, I wouldn’t stop loving you.
I wouldn’t hope for an “us” anymore, but I can’t simply erase this love.
Just like I said back then:
“There was and there will only ever be you.”
I’ve realized that I still have so much to learn.
And I am learning.
I’m doing it because you opened my eyes.
I’m doing it because I want to… because I have to.
I’ve disappointed many people in my life.
But most of all, I disappointed my younger self—the one who was so often locked away inside me.
The one I rarely looked at, the one I kept suppressing, just like others did.
You were the one who changed that.
You were the one who kicked those doors open.
And there are so many more doors still there.
I feel it every time I talk to someone, every time I have to face something new, every time I look at myself, and every time I talk about my love for you in therapy.
You probably have no idea how much of an impact you had.
I hope that one day, I’ll be able to show you.
I wish that someday we can talk again.
But I don’t think words are what truly matter.
What would matter are actions—that my words aren’t just empty air, that I actually do something.
And I need to prove that not just to you, but to myself.
I don’t want to be the person who is stuck in her life anymore.
Not the one who doubts everything and everyone.
Not the person I used to be.
I am me.
I am Riley.
I’ve been through horrific things in my life—but like you always said:
that is not my entire life.
I am me.
And even if I don’t yet know every detail about who I am, I know this much:
right now, right here, is exactly where I’m meant to be.
I have to be here—
so I can finally be free.
Midnight Soul 