When you say goodbye to a girl you almost dated, you make her second-guess herself. She always thought that you texted her during early mornings and hugged her for extra long because you liked her. She used to replay those cute moments in her head again and again because they gave her hope.

But now, she replays those moments for a different reason. To reanalyze your moves. To see what she might have missed.

Because if you’re gone, you must not have done those things exactly the way she remembers them. She must have misunderstood what you were trying to tell her.

Maybe you only texted her so early because you woke up lonely and bored. Maybe you only hugged her for so long because she didn’t let go.

Or maybe all of the flirting between you two was only in her imagination. Maybe she made everything up because she so badly wanted to believe that you felt the same way.

Deep down, she knows that’s not true. She knows she didn’t read your signals wrong. She has a strong sense that you felt the same way that she felt.

But if you’re gone, there must be something she’s missing, right?

When you say goodbye to a girl you almost dated, you confuse her. You make her wonder if you liked her in the beginning and then lost interest. You make her wonder if she was too talkative or too quiet or too tall or too short.

You used to be the person who raised her confidence, who made her feel beautiful. But now, you’re the person who makes her feel ugly. Who makes her question every aspect of her looks and personality — because there must have been something about her that wasn’t good enough, something that drove you away. She must have done something wrong.

She just doesn’t understand why you walked away from her. She can’t figure out a plausible reason why you could have gotten so close to her and then abandoned her, because you didn’t seem like a fuckboy. You didn’t seem like the type to use her and lead her on. You seemed genuine. Authentic.

When you say goodbye to a girl you almost dated, you singlehandedly destroy the future she had in mind. She thought that you were going to ask her to go steady and meet her parents and spend the holidays with her family. She thought you were the real deal, someone serious about her.

Even though she was still technically single when you held her hand and called her cute, she never thought of herself as single. She already thought of herself as yours.

It doesn’t matter that you never officially dated, because she got attached to you as soon as the flirting started. As soon as you made her believe that you liked her, too. As soon as she pictured a future alongside you.

But now, you’re gone. Now, she’s alone.

And she still can’t seem to wrap her mind around how that happened.

Holly Riordan is the author of
Severe(d), A Creepy Poetry Collection.
Pre-order your copy here.