Soul Friend Forever

I still call you my soul friend

in my head, quietly,

like a nickname I’m not allowed to say out loud.

We don’t talk now—

not the way we did

When we could finish each other’s stories

and argue about nothing for sport.

﹁﹂

I keep seeing things

I’d send you immediately:

a weird cloud shaped like a shoe,

a meme that would make you snort-laugh,

a song that sounds like our old drives.

My thumb hovers over your name

then backs away

like it touched a hot stove.

﹁﹂

It’s strange how a title can survive

the silence that killed the conversation.

How “forever” can still feel true

even when “right now” is empty.

﹁﹂

Sometimes I wonder

if you miss me in the same small ways—

If you ever hear my laugh

in someone else’s laugh

and feel briefly haunted.

﹁﹂

I’m not waiting.

I’m just carrying the friendship

like a smooth stone in my pocket—

worn down by time,

still warm from my hand,

still real

even when no one sees it.