hyperfocused

you were one of the first guys i ever had a crush on, and i apologize. i didn't know how to process it. i was a teenager still figuring out how auto-renew on proactiv works and what the pythagorean theorem even is. i didn't really have time to work through my feelings the normal way. but i don't think you did either.

i didn't understand that part of you, and i'm sorry i didn't. as an adult, i worry i didn't support you as much as i should have or maybe i enabled a side of you that you didn't want to face.

you weren't the same person when you were around me, and everyone could see it except you.

i've never had a man be so protective of me before i met you. i know those feelings came from a place in your heart you didn't even know you had.

it's sad to think about the feelings you had to keep hidden and maybe still do. you never had a girlfriend you could keep, but you somehow always found your way back to me, crying on my shoulder and gripping me tight while i told you it was going to be fine.

it'd be late-night facebook messages going back and forth as you tried to work through your thoughts with me. i didn't always know how to follow them, scattered and not quite linear, but i knew it was you, raw and open, in a way no one else had ever seen.

to this day, i worry you've never let yourself be that open with anyone else.

you were authentically yourself around me, which i not only admired but deeply respected. a lot of people open up to me for some reason, but for you, i was a kind of fresh air you'd never gotten from another man in your life.

i was this opening into a world you were so scared of. i never told you i was gay, but i think you already knew. we were that in sync.

and you know what? i'll say it. i think you're closeted. i think you had a crush on me and you didn't know what to do with it. you asked my best friend if you could kiss him "for the bit" and i remember him running up to me saying "Anthony. You're right."

some of my favorite words, honestly. i always knew i could see right through you. you're like water to me. i know what that beautiful mind and heart truly holds, even now.

i hope you know you don't have to keep being the macho man you're pretending to be. you always wore your leather jacket, rings, and necklace when you hung out with me. never with anyone else though. just. me.