We Loved Each Other in the Wrong Timeline

In another life,

you came to me barefoot,

early autumn in your eyes,

and no urgency in your voice.

You were not already promised to someone else.

I was not still healing from the fire

someone else had left behind.

We had time,

then.

Time to meet in coffee shops

without counting minutes

like loose change in our pockets.

Time to kiss under lazy skylines

and not apologize for the moonlight

catching the tremble in our hands.

But here,

in this cruel version of the story,

we were each half a sentence

from different chapters.

Your story said “next year.”

Mine said “not yet.”

You held me like someone

trying to memorize a song

before the radio fades.

And I listened to your heartbeat

like it could rewrite fate

if I just laid still long enough.

But the clock was louder than us.

And love,

as it turns out,

is not immune to poor timing.

We loved in whispers,

tucked in between bus rides and borrowed hours.

Our affection wore disguises—

passing glances, coded texts,

that one brush of your fingers on my wrist

that still lives in my pulse.

In another timeline,

your voice isn’t a ghost

in my favorite song.

In another universe,

we get to grow old arguing over groceries

and leaving love notes in sock drawers.

There is no guilt there.

No what-ifs.

But this is the timeline

where we let go

before we ever really held on.

Where I smile at your wedding photos

like I’m not in them,

just behind the camera,

holding my breath.

And still—

I do not curse our ending.

Because even here,

in this wrong place,

in this almost-love,

you made me believe in softness again.

You reminded me

that the heart can glow again,

even under heavy grief.

And that some people

are not meant to stay—

they are meant to show us

how much love we are still capable of.

Even if the story is unfinished.

Even if the last line

is goodbye.