Day 1.
November 26th, 2020. Thanksgiving night. I got an Instagram DM from a boy that had been following me for a month. I didn't know who he was or why he followed but… he was handsome. I liked a photo. For the plot. He messaged me. Said he thought I was cute and asked for my Snapchat. Now, I know what you're thinking. Asking for Snapchat is like saying you just want to hookup. But, I don’t know. It didn't feel like that. After just a couple messages, we were already on the phone. That turned into a two hour call filled with comments like, “me too!” and “that’s awesome,” and “I really like talking to you.” It was Chance the Rapper that I think did it for the both of us. I had never met anyone that was as into his music as I was. He said the same. That was probably a whole hour of our conversation.
We bonded over concerts, passions, and ambitions. I was shocked at how quickly I started to feel something for him. And I couldn’t wait to see him. I invited him to a drive-in movie. The Nightmare Before Christmas. It was a pop-up drive-in experience for the holidays. He said yes, and it immediately took my breath away. I wasn’t really surprised he said yes. Maybe I was. But he just made me so nervous… in the absolute best way.
Day 5.
The conversations were already stretching late into the night. We quizzed each other on Chance the Rapper lyrics, looking back at our favorite verses, surprised by how much we shared — not just taste, but values. He loved “The Big Day”, the album where Chance talks about marriage and family, and he told me that if he were ever that happy, he’d want to express it through his art too.
That night, I told him I had a crush on him. He said he felt the same, and that it felt like he’d known me for a while. When we talked on the phone, he said he loved hearing my voice. Somewhere between the messages and the call, the tone shifted. He told me he had a really good feeling about where this was going, and wanted to make one thing clear. The drive-in movie we had planned wasn’t casual. It was a date. He wanted me to understand his intentions. That he was interested in me. And I believed him, because nothing he said felt hesitant.
Day 8.
December 3rd. I was preparing the backseat of my 2003 Pontiac Montana, when his car pulled up behind me. My heart sank, but also somehow ended up in my throat. I could feel my fingers and toes tingling, knees buckling, voice trembling. I think I even started to sweat. It was an LA December, so it wasn’t that cold anyways. I ran inside to grab one more thing. But, let’s be real… I needed another second to not explode. I went back outside, and there he was. I had already seen him on FaceTime, but he was so much better in person. Handsome. Tall. Gentle. We went in for a hug and despite how tense I probably was, I could feel myself melt into him. The best start to the best first date.
Once we settled into the open trunk of the van, the space felt warm and playful. Purple and orange twinkly lights were strung overhead, pillows and blankets layered on top of a mattress cushion I’d wedged into place, everything glowing softly against the dark. We ate the food we’d ordered, passed back and forth the snacks he brought, our shoulders pressed close as the movie flickered in front of us. We tried to watch it. Kind of. But the tension kept building. Quiet. Magnetic. At some point we looked at each other and just knew. When he kissed me for the first time, it was slow and careful, like he was asking rather than taking. Warm. Unrushed. My heart felt like it might jump straight out of my chest. I couldn’t have imagined a better first kiss. After that, the movie barely existed. We were too busy taking each other in. In the pauses between kisses, he looked at me in the most captivating way. I saw intention and softness and desire held gently in his eyes. It felt like being chosen in real time.
Day 10.
Our closeness intensified. He told me I had his attention — that I was turning his curiosities into certainties. That I was building his desire and feeding his interest. Even admitted he was afraid of letting me down. His honesty was disarming. He said he hoped he didn’t scare me with how connected he felt. That he wasn’t one to hesitate when he knew what he wanted, and he wanted me. I wanted him too. Nothing he’d said made me pull back or doubt him. If anything, it made me lean in that much more. By then, the idea of us no longer felt hypothetical. It felt like something already forming, something we were both actively choosing.
Day 12.
The doorbell rings. I miss it. I see the note left behind. We’re sorry we missed you, with instructions on how to pick up my Edible Arrangement. It was a 20 minute drive through the powerful Santa Ana winds, shaking my car with every gust. My hands were gripped tightly on the wheel as I rocked back and forth at every stoplight. Still, the butterflies in my stomach were stronger. The whole ride felt like an out-of-body experience. He already had such an incredible effect on me. I’d never felt like this before. At the store, they hand me a beautiful bouquet of pineapple, melon, and strawberries, arranged carefully and brightly. Some pieces covered in chocolate, others shaped like hearts. When I got home, I finally read the note attached..
For being so sweet <3. I sat there longer than I needed to, holding it, feeling chosen in a way that felt deliberate.
Two days later, he said he was falling for me. I felt it too.
Day 15.
One night, we were parked in a quiet park long after dark, sitting in the back seat of his car, the windows fogging slightly as we kissed. When it began to feel like the moment might move forward, something in me tightened. I hesitated. I told him I didn’t want our first time to be in a car. The words came out quickly, already braced for the familiar aftermath.
He didn’t hesitate. He didn’t sigh or pull away. He said it was fine, and that we didn’t have to do anything I wasn’t comfortable with. Still, panic filled my chest. I apologized, told him I felt like I had ruined the moment. In past relationships, that had been the answer. Ruined. Too much. A letdown. But he told me I hadn’t ruined anything. That it was okay. He meant it. He stayed.
I didn’t stop bracing that night. But I learned, for the first time, that having a boundary didn’t make me the problem. That my body saying no wasn’t something to be punished for.
Day 21.
Our first night together wasn’t dramatic. It was gentle in a way that felt unexpected but comforting. We checked into a hotel in Baldwin Park, a Courtyard, clean and quiet, and spent the evening doing ordinary things that somehow felt new. We played Mario Kart, argued over who would pay for dinner. He insisted. I pretended to protest. We laughed and sang in the car. I’d never felt my shoulders drop like that. It felt easy, like we were already practicing something familiar.
Later, when we laid down together, there was no rush. We moved slowly, checking in without needing to ask. At one point, he told me he wanted to wait. That he wanted our first time to be special. The words settled over me like a promise, not a pause. We curled into each other instead, falling asleep tangled together, the kind of closeness that makes your body exhale.
I woke up next to him the next morning, sunlight slipping through the curtains, and felt something shift quietly inside me. There was no urgency, no fear of being sent home too soon. Just the steady comfort of being there, of being wanted in the daylight too.
The next day, he told me how happy he was. That he felt like he could be himself with me. And I believed him, because nothing about that night had asked me to be anything other than exactly who I was.
There were other days where our growing relationship settled into something quieter. Time together felt unremarkable in the best way. Simple. Steady. Unforced. We sat in the park, passed time without needing to fill it. There was a calm to it that surprised me. It felt easy to stay.
When I asked him what his favorite things about me were, he said… my mind, the way I think, the way I see things. No one had ever said that to me before. I had spent so much of my life being wanted for what I could offer physically, for what I could give or do or be in someone else’s hands. Being wanted for my mind felt different. It felt like being chosen for who I actually was.
He told me he had an amazing feeling about us. He talked about marriage casually, about wanting a family someday, about how happy he imagined that kind of life could be. He said he wanted to be someone I could see myself marrying. He even asked about my dream engagement ring, curious about my jewelry preferences in a way that felt playful, not performative. By then, he was already speaking the same future out loud that I was quietly imagining.
Day 36.
New Year’s Eve. He met my mom. I had always been private about my relationships with her. It was partly out of habit, but mostly because there had never been anything steady enough to explain. This felt different.
At some point, we were all standing in the kitchen, eating my grandma’s potatoes straight out of the pan, laughing, chatting. After midnight, he and I ended up outside, sitting on the couch under a blanket. The air was brisk and chilly, but not uncomfortable. The kind of cold you don’t mind when you’re close to someone. He pulled me in beside him and asked me to be his girlfriend. He said it simply, like it wasn’t a question he’d wrestled with. He said it just felt right.
That night, I got to see how naturally he fit into my space. There was a steadiness to it that I settled into. This was what it looked like when someone chose you out loud. Not privately or hypothetically, but in a way that other people could see.
In the days that followed, the language didn’t soften. On January 2, he told me he felt like something incredible was going to happen with me and him. A few days later, he sent me photos of an apartment he said he could see us living in together.
We lived ninety miles apart. Far enough that we couldn’t slip into each other’s lives casually. Most of our connection lived on the phone — on FaceTime, in long text threads and hours long phone calls that stretched late into the night. When we were together in person, it felt concentrated. Time expanded. Those hours carried more weight because there were fewer of them. Overnight dates weren’t just romantic. They were rare pockets where everything we’d been building finally got to exist in the same space.
Day 41.
Malibu felt like a reward. We drove up the coast together, stopped at the grocery store, moved easily through the aisles like it wasn’t new. We settled into the AirBnB, cooked dinner side by side, touched without thinking about it. Everything felt domestic, intimate, like a glimpse of something longer than a night.
Then, I stepped into the bathroom and came back out dressed in something I chose carefully, a color I knew he would love. My heart pounding, my confidence buoyed by how safe I felt with him. It was a small but meaningful moment for me, choosing to be seen like that, choosing to want something and step toward it. When we crossed that line together, it felt tender and mutual and real. Paced. Like something we had both arrived at with care.
The rest of the night, we spent time together quietly — talking, being close, letting the hours stretch. When we finally went to sleep, it felt earned. I remember thinking how rare it was to have this much uninterrupted time with someone, how quickly it made everything else fade.
The morning came abruptly. He was quieter, distant in a way he’d warned me about before. The kind of mood he’d sometimes experience in the mornings. He woke up wanting space, wanting to be alone. I didn’t know how to support him through it yet. I just knew that the night had felt so full, and the morning felt small by comparison. We cleaned up, packed our things, and left sooner than I expected to. Sooner than I wanted to.
Later, he told me he’d actually liked waking up with me there and being close, even when he was in one of those moods. But at the time, it felt jarring. Like something warm had been interrupted before I’d learned how to hold it.
In the days after, he said he was excited for our future together. That he felt desired with me.
But soon, the tone began to shift. He told me he felt out of sync sometimes, that getting close brought things up for him, that distance made it harder. He reassured me even as he pulled back, telling me to trust him, telling me it wasn’t about me. I believed him. I wanted to. The closeness was there, but it no longer felt steady. It felt conditional. Something that could appear and disappear without warning. Still, he said things like, “I’m not going to let you go,” and “I want everything with you.” And, “I’m excited to see what’s going to grow from here.” The words landed even as the ground beneath them shifted.
Day 55.
We met at a gorgeous hotel overlooking Huntington Beach. I pulled my car in the valet, gave up my keys, picked up my surfboard shaped room key, and headed to the eighth floor. I remember standing in that elevator so vividly. Each floor named a different shade of blue. When I stepped into that room, I was nervous. In a good way. I felt like we had talked things through and this was the perfect place to reset our energy. We had a breathtaking ocean view, and a free bottle of wine. Being with him felt deep and meaningful. After we settled in, we headed toward the promenade. We held hands and walked together, stopping in store after store. Simple quality time. We needed that.
Then everything changed. When we got back in the room, he was saying things just didn’t feel right. He said the distance was too much, the age difference misaligned us, and that he couldn't completely be himself with me. He said, walking down the boardwalk holding my hand made him realize something wasn’t clicking. He couldn’t fully be present. It was all unraveling before my eyes. I was stunned. I don’t even really remember much about that conversation, but I remember feeling my gut in my throat. I couldn't stop crying. I was trying to make sense of what just wasn’t making sense.
I still stayed. But I’ve never been so heartbroken. He took the future from me. We still kissed. We walked into the shower with our clothes on, feeling what it was like to be close, to be intimate, one last time. I had no idea how to let him. The only man that saw me for who was at my core. The future he started to paint for me.
I’ve asked myself, how could such a short relationship undo me so completely? It’s because he didn’t just give me hope. He gave me evidence.
Months later, he told me he didn’t remember if he meant everything he said about the future. That when he gets into certain mental states, his memory blurs. I tried to understand what it meant to forget falling in love with someone, and what it said about the version of me who still remembered every word. I wondered whether safety could exist if it only lived in one body at a time.
For a long time, it didn't get easier day to day. Grief took over my whole body. I felt like I was collapsing from the inside out. The idea of a future suddenly felt so foreign to me. I couldn’t even imagine how I’d get out of bed the next day. What I had been hoping and praying for for years, slipped right through my fingers.
Day 1,825.
Five years later, I’m writing this from inside the echo of those fifty-five days. I’m not undone in the same way anymore, but I’m not untouched either. I’m still grieving. I’m still healing. I am still learning what it means to carry safety forward, to recognize it when it appears, and to survive when it leaves. He is in me, always. Not as longing, not as regret, but as an imprint. And the next time someone makes me feel safe, he’ll be there too. Engrained in the woman another man will fall in love with someday. Something I wouldn’t be able to fully appreciate had I not known the loss and the fragility of love. He is proof that safety once existed, and therefore can again. The knowledge that it was real, even if it couldn’t last.
Fifty-five days taught me what safety felt like. Five years taught me what it costs to lose it.
This is not the end of the story. It’s the place where I finally stopped pretending it was small.
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