At twelve in the midnight, the room was quiet but his mind wasn't.
The fan hummed above him like it was counting seconds, each one heavier than the last. Sleep stood somewhere far away, watching him, refusing to come closer. Every time he shut his eyes, her face appeared—not the one that once looked at him, but the one that didn't anymore. The one that laughed for someone else. The one that proved, again and again, that he had never been the chosen one.
He lay there, staring at the ceiling, replaying a love that had only ever lived on one side.
He had given everything without being asked. Time. Care. Hope. He had convinced himself that if he stayed long enough, loved hard enough, became good enough—one day she would turn around and choose him. But life didn't work that way. She walked forward, hand in hand with someone else, while he remained stuck at the beginning, wondering if he had even existed in her story at all.
He told himself he hated her. Then he told himself the truth—that he didn't hate her, he hated how invisible he had been.
He had blocked her number, blocked her chats, blocked her voice. Yet every few hours, like a bad habit or an addiction, his fingers betrayed him. He checked. Again. And again. Each time finding proof that she was happy, alive, moving on—while he was still bleeding quietly in the dark.
The thought hurt more than jealousy. It was the realization that she didn't miss him. That she never would. That while he was losing sleep over memories, she was making new ones with someone else, unaware of the damage left behind.
"Why am I like this?" he wondered.
Why did his heart cling to someone who never held it? Why did his mind obsess over a person who didn't care enough to look back? The answers never came—only guilt, regret, and a crushing sense of worthlessness. Not having a girlfriend hurt, yes. But feeling replaceable hurt more.
He wanted to move on. God, he wanted to. He didn't want to talk to her ever again. Didn't want to know her happiness if it didn't include him. He wanted distance, peace, a version of himself that didn't collapse at midnight.
But wanting something and having the strength for it were two different things.
Right now, he had neither energy nor confidence. Just exhaustion. Just the quiet acceptance that healing wasn't instant—it was a slow, painful walk through nights like this.
So he lay there, breathing through the ache, telling himself one small truth:
This pain meant he was capable of loving deeply.
And one day—maybe not soon, but someday—it would end.
Not because she came back.
But because he finally chose himself.