​The Sunset of Us

It’s hardly shocking anymore—people’s capacity to disappoint. I learned that bitter lesson years ago. Anticipating disappointment has become as natural as expecting the sunset around 6 PM. The real surprise would be if the sun failed to dip below the horizon.

I held no expectations of you, yet somewhere, a naive part of me clung to a frail hope. Perhaps, what you were doing wasn’t as I feared. Perhaps, I should not have allowed that sliver of hope, because deep down, I sensed the truth. You were filling a void. You were lonely, and I was convenient. You didn’t need to spend countless hours with me, share those moments, or reawaken feelings I thought had long since died. If all you needed was companionship, you would have kept it simple—just friendship. But friends don’t speak the way we did. Friends don’t share looks loaded with unspoken words the way you looked at me.

You had no right to use my attention to fill your emptiness, only to retract it all once you returned to your old lover—as if I meant nothing, as if all of it meant nothing. In just one night, everything you gave, you rescinded. Everything you took from me, discarded.

Now, you’re back with her. Overnight, it’s as though we never happened. And you claim happiness, mere days after gazing into my eyes, calling them beautiful. You always maintained that we could never be, that your heart belonged to her. Yet, you selfishly took what you had no right to—moments and emotions, dreams of quiet seclusions and shared days—only to cast them aside.

You’ve disappeared now, as if you never existed in my world. You’ve shifted realms, once again where it suits you. You’re content, your intoxication with my eyes faded, your longing to hear my voice gone, your desire to linger in our shared spaces extinguished.

I am neither disappointed nor surprised. I merely observe, as life’s old patterns unfold and people reveal their true selves. I walk away devoid of emotion. I feel nothing for you, and perhaps that’s the deepest sorrow of all—that overnight, my feelings vanished completely.