The Night My Heart Forgot to Breathe



The night was still,

but my chest was a battlefield.

No bombs, no fire —

just silence louder than thunder

and your name echoing

like a prayer that never got answered.

I sat by the window,

watching the stars fall

like promises you made,

breaking quietly

somewhere between hope and hurt.

You didn’t slam the door when you left.

You just faded,

like the scent of your shampoo on my pillow,

or the warmth on your side of the bed.

I think that hurt worse.

I reached for air,

but the sky had swallowed it.

The moon blinked once

then looked away,

as if it couldn’t bear to watch me

crack open.

My heart forgot how to breathe —

not just once,

but over and over,

with every picture, every memory,

every almost-message I typed but never sent.

Do you remember the night

we sat under that broken streetlight,

sharing secrets like kids

who didn’t know pain yet?

You said,

"Don’t ever disappear."

I didn’t.

You did.

I tried to fill the void with noise —

music,

movies,

long walks that led nowhere.

But even the wind

whispered your name

through the trees.

People say time heals.

What they don’t say

is how slowly time walks

when you're trying to forget

someone who never said sorry.

I wore your favorite color

on accident yesterday.

It felt like a betrayal —

to myself,

to the healing I pretend is happening.

There’s a letter in my drawer

I never sent.

It starts with “I miss you”

and ends with “But I’m learning.”

Every word in between is a war

between holding on and letting go.

I don't hate you.

I don’t love you either —

not in the way that breaks me now.

But somewhere inside this healing skin,

there’s still a version of me

that believed in us.

That version still cries at night.

But I promise —

one day,

my heart will remember how to breathe.

It will beat not with longing,

but with peace.

And maybe then,

on some far-off night,

you’ll look at the stars

and feel a pinch in your chest —

like air slipping away —

and wonder if

I ever missed you.

You’ll never know

how much.