She doesn’t want to cut you out of her life. She doesn’t want to lose a close friend. She doesn’t want to say goodbye to you, just because she knows she doesn’t have a chance with you.

But being around you hurts too much.

She would love to stay friends with you over social media, but she doesn’t want to be reminded of what she’s lost every time she has a connection to the internet. She doesn’t want to see how happy you are in all your pictures, how perfect you look with your pretty new girlfriend. She doesn’t want daily reminders that the boy she loves is busy loving somebody else.

She would love to keep texting you, but she knows that she would read too far into every message. She knows that every time you told her about a fight with your girlfriend, she would feel a glimmer of hope. Even though you’re off limits right now, she would daydream about the future, about the possibility of you breaking up with your person and choosing her instead. 

She would love to have late night conversations with you, but hearing you talk about other girls would be torture. Even if you’re just mentioning your girlfriend casually, saying how you just got home from a fun date, she would feel a sinking in her stomach that would stay with her for hours. She would feel her heart break more and more each day.

She would love to go out and grab drinks with you like she does with the rest of her friends, but she doesn’t know if she could stop herself from flirting with you. She knows that the alcohol would make her more open with you than she should be. She knows that she would say or do something inappropriate. Something that would ruin your friendship.

She would love to be friends with you, but she would never be satisfied with high-fives instead hand holding. With kisses on the cheek instead of directly on the lips.

She would never be happy knowing that you’re only spending a few hours with her, and then get to go home to your girlfriend, the person you care about more than her. The person you’ve chosen over her.

She wants so much more from you than friendship. And since she knows that’s never going to happen, she has to keep her distance. She has to do what’s best for her sanity and stay away.

Of course, cutting you out of her life is the last thing she wants to do. She doesn’t want to stop seeing your face, stop hearing your voice.

She wants to spend entire nights texting you. She wants to spend mornings daydreaming about you and afternoons getting food with you. But if she keeps doing those things, then she’ll grow even more attached to you.

She wants to be friends with you, but she knows that would be a bad idea. She knows that it would make it impossible for her to get over you. 

Holly Riordan is the author of Lifeless Souls, available here.