There are some people you don’t remember meeting. They just… appear in your life one day, and before you know it, they’re a constant. Like they’ve always been there, like they were always supposed to be.
That was Ethan for me.
He slid into my life when we were sixteen. A quiet transfer student who wore navy hoodies even in the summer and read books during lunch breaks. I don’t even remember our first real conversation—only that one day, I was sitting next to him at lunch, and it felt like I’d been doing it forever.
We didn’t talk about anything profound in the beginning. It was math homework, teachers who talked too much, music we liked. He was calm in a way most boys weren’t at that age—unhurried, patient. And kind, in ways that weren’t always loud.
When I was late to class, he’d cover for me. When I failed my driving test, he bought me a keychain that said “Future Road Hazard” and laughed until I did too. And when my dog died the winter of our senior year, he sat on my porch with me in the cold, neither of us saying a word. He just stayed.
It was easy to love him.
But I didn’t—at least, not then. Or maybe I did, in a quiet way I hadn’t understood yet.
It wasn’t until years later—long after high school ended and we’d both moved into our separate adult lives—that it hit me with a kind of slow-burning ache. Like waking up one day and realizing you’ve memorized a face without ever trying. You don’t know when it started, only that it’s there now. Permanent.
---
We were twenty-three the night it became real.
I was sitting on the floor of my apartment, surrounded by takeout boxes and torn wrapping paper. It was my birthday. Ethan had shown up after his late shift with a poorly wrapped gift and that guilty smile he always wore when he was doing something thoughtful but didn’t want to make a big deal out of it.
“It’s not much,” he said, handing me a small box.
It was a mug. Simple, black, with the words “You’re doing your best, and that’s enough.” printed in tiny white font.
“I saw it and thought of you,” he added, rubbing the back of his neck.
I held it in my hands longer than I needed to. “Thanks,” I whispered, not looking up. “It’s perfect.”
He reached out, brushed something off my cheek—a crumb, maybe, or nothing at all. And for a second, everything in me froze.
It wasn’t the touch that startled me. It was how natural it felt. How much I wanted it to linger.
That was the first time I realized I was in trouble.
---
The problem wasn’t falling for Ethan.
The problem was that Ethan had a girlfriend.
Mira.
She was beautiful in a subtle, graceful kind of way—long, chestnut hair, the kind of calm voice that made people lean in. I liked her. I wanted to like her. She never gave me a reason not to.
The three of us had lunch together once. I watched them share glances across the table, their hands brushing without meaning to, the way she knew exactly how much sugar he liked in his coffee.
I laughed when they joked. I smiled when they teased each other. But the whole time, something in my chest folded in on itself like paper.
Later that night, Ethan texted me.
Ethan: “Thanks for today. Mira really liked you.”
I stared at the screen for a long time before replying.
Me: “I liked her too. You two are cute.”
I meant it. I really did.
And also—I didn’t.
---
People always ask why you don’t just confess your feelings. As if love is a clean thing, like a math equation or a confession in the rain. But what they don’t understand is that sometimes, love is the quietest kind of war. One you fight inside yourself, day after day, without anyone ever knowing.
I loved him quietly.
Not in grand declarations or dramatic stares. But in the way I remembered how he took his tea. In the playlists I made with songs I knew he’d like. In the extra key I had made for him when he kept forgetting his.
He never noticed. Or maybe he did, and just didn’t say anything.
But sometimes, he did things that made me wonder.
Like the time I mentioned, offhand, that I’d been craving cinnamon rolls, and he showed up the next morning with two from my favorite bakery. “I was driving by anyway,” he said casually. He lived thirty minutes away.
Or when he stayed up until 2 a.m. helping me put together a shelf I could’ve easily done alone. “You’d mess it up without me,” he teased. But he brought snacks and played music while we worked, like it was the best place he could be.
He never crossed a line. Never said anything he shouldn’t. But his actions—they whispered things I wasn’t brave enough to believe.
Maybe that was the worst part.
He never gave me hope. But he never quite took it away either.
---
One evening, I called him after a long day. I was exhausted—work stress, family drama, a broken water heater. I didn’t mean to cry, but I did.
He didn’t say much. Just listened. Then, an hour later, there was a knock on my door.
He stood there with a bag of groceries and a look of concern in his eyes.
“You sounded tired,” he said. “Figured you hadn’t eaten.”
He made me dinner that night—nothing fancy, just pasta and frozen garlic bread. But it tasted like comfort. Like care.
He didn’t bring up the crying. Didn’t ask questions. Just stayed until I fell asleep on the couch, blanket tucked around me.
When I woke up, he was gone. But the dishes were done. The lights were off. The door locked.
And there was a note on the counter in his messy handwriting: “Get some rest. You’ve got this.”
---
I told myself a thousand times it didn’t mean anything.
That this was just Ethan—caring, dependable, loyal Ethan—doing what he always did. Being there.
But the heart doesn’t care for logic. It only knows how to ache.
And mine did, in a million silent ways.
Whenever he talked about Mira.
Whenever he picked up her calls mid-sentence.
Whenever I imagined what it would be like to be the one he loved like that.
It wasn’t jealousy, exactly. It was grief. Grieving something that was never mine, never promised, but deeply, deeply wanted.
Sometimes I wondered—if I had met him a little earlier. If I had said something when the timing was better. If life had unfolded just slightly differently.
Would he have chosen me?
But that’s the thing about almosts.
They’re heavy.
They haunt.
And they never leave room for what is.
Only what could’ve been.
