“Winter must be cold for those with no warm memories.”
It was a cold evening, and I tried to warm myself with a cup of coffee. Sitting on my old wooden chair in the bedroom, I stared outside the window, admiring the sunset’s wonders. The dying sun had just painted the clouds with golden strokes, a bittersweet beauty that reminded me of the evenings I had spent in the valley—when time felt infinite, and love felt permanent.
A sudden vibration pulled me out of my thoughts. An Instagram notification. My heart skipped. A message from her boyfriend.
For days, I didn’t open it. The message stayed in my requests, burning in the back of my mind. What could he possibly want? Did he find out about me from her and feel compelled to speak? Did he want answers? Closure? Or worse—did he want to stake his claim and tell me she was his now? My chest tightened at the thought, but I pushed it away. It wasn’t about what he might say. It was about whether I could face the truth.
Four years had passed since she walked away, but I wasn’t ready to accept she was gone. For over 1,300 days, I had lived with my own version of reality—a reality where she hadn’t left, and the memories of us still belonged to me. But the weight of his message kept gnawing at me.
Finally, I gathered enough courage and opened it.
“Hey… need to talk to you about some important stuff. Drop me a message asap.”
I swallowed hard and typed a reply: “What’s it about?” His answer didn’t come that night. Another sleepless night passed, my mind spinning with questions I didn’t want answered.
The next morning, his reply came:
“It’s about her.”
My chest constricted. He continued:
“Why are her pictures still on your Instagram?”
I didn’t have pictures of her. I knew exactly what he meant. The paintings. The sketches. The digital drawings. I looked around my messy study table. A painting of us leaned against the wall, and half a dozen unfinished sketches sat in a pile beneath it.
Why did I still have them? Why couldn’t I let go? My mind scrambled for an excuse, but my heart screamed the answer: Because I still love her.
The truth echoed through me, loud and undeniable. I loved her, even after all these years. I loved her despite the silence she left behind, despite the way she walked away without closure. I loved her because we had shared five years of our lives, built dreams together, and vowed to never let go. How could I forget the life we had envisioned? How could I erase the love I still carried?
But I knew he didn’t need to hear all of that.
I replied calmly: “I don’t have any pictures of her. Those are paintings I did. If they’re bothering you both, I’ll take them down.”
His response stung:
“Great. Take them down asap. By the way, nice artistic skills.”
Sarcastic. Dismissive. And then, the part that hit me hardest: “She’s my present and future now.”
I wanted to reply: “What about the past?” But I didn’t.
I was the past. We were the past. Everything we had shared—the laughter, the love, the sacrifices—was now reduced to a forgotten chapter. A long paragraph of past participles.
I stared at the paintings on my desk. They were my escape, my way of surviving the void she left behind. Each stroke of color had been an attempt to recreate moments we shared, to hold onto the pieces of her that still lived in my heart. But now, they had to go. I no longer had the right to hold onto her, even in the form of art. She had a life without me—a life I wasn’t a part of.
One by one, I deleted the posts. Each removal felt like tearing away a piece of myself. My fingers hovered over the last one, my chest hollowing as I swiped it away.
When I was done, I messaged him back:
“They’re gone. You don’t have to worry anymore.”
I stared at the blank profile where those moments once lived. The emptiness stung, but I understood. She was his present and future. I was just a relic of her past. I could no longer express my longing for what we once had.
But no one could take the memories away. They were etched into my soul, engraved on the walls of my heart. No matter how much time passed, no matter how far she was, our story was mine to carry. And though I deleted the art, I vowed to keep everything we had alive within me.
Some loves are never meant to be forgotten.
MALE 29
SYDNEY
