The Love Letter I Never Sent

The Love Letter I Never Sent

I still remember the day I wrote it. It was raining, not the kind of rain that floods streets or shouts against windows—but the soft kind. The type that makes everything feel quiet, like the world is pausing to listen.

I had been carrying the words inside me for months. Words I never had the courage to speak. Words that had grown roots somewhere deep in my chest.

You were my best friend. That’s how it started. That’s what I told myself when I caught my breath every time you laughed. When your name lit up my phone and the world suddenly felt warmer. When silence felt comfortable between us, and yet, my heart screamed all the things I couldn’t say out loud.

So I wrote them down.

I didn’t plan to. But that evening, sitting at my desk with your favorite song playing in the background, the words poured out of me like they’d been waiting. You were happy. You had someone else, someone who made your eyes light up in a way I once dreamed I could. And more than anything, I wanted you to be happy—even if it wasn’t with me.

So I kept the letter. Unsent. Unread.

People always talk about grand confessions, about how honesty is the brave thing. But sometimes, the bravest thing is silence. Sometimes, love is knowing when not to speak.

Years have passed since then. We drifted apart, not in a bitter way, just the slow, natural separation of lives moving in different directions. You’re living your story, and I’m living mine.

But the letter? I still have it.

I found it recently while packing to move. The envelope was yellowed, the ink slightly smudged. I read it, and for a moment, I was 22 again—heart racing, hands trembling, full of hope and fear.

And I didn’t feel regret.

Because even though you never read it, the letter mattered. It was proof that I loved. That I felt something deep and real. That I was brave enough to write it, even if I wasn’t brave enough to send it.

Some love stories never begin. Some never end. And some live quietly in the spaces between, in folded letters and unspoken words.

Not all love needs to be known to be real.

Some words live forever, even if they are never read

There’s something I’ve been meaning to tell you, but every time I look at you, the words get tangled between my ribs.

You’re more than just my best friend. Somewhere along the way, you became the thought I wake up to and the calm I fall asleep with. You’re the reason I smile at red lights, the voice in my head when I need courage.

I don’t know when it changed, only that it did.

Maybe it was the way you remembered the little things—how I like my coffee, the book I never finished, the way I avoid eye contact when I lie. Maybe it was the way you looked at me when I wasn’t even speaking, like you were trying to hear what I wasn’t saying.

Whatever it was, it left a mark.

I love you. Quietly. Completely. And maybe selfishly.

Because I don’t know if you feel the same. I don’t know if you’ve ever looked at me and seen something more.

But I had to say it somewhere, even if you never see it.

Because love deserves a voice, even if it’s whispered into the void.

With all of me,

Me. I remember folding the letter carefully and sliding it into a plain white envelope. I even wrote your name on it.

And then I hid it in the back of my drawer.

Days passed. Then weeks. The letter stayed there, untouched. Not because the feelings faded, but because I realized what it could cost.