​You Were My Favorite Story

Today, as I was arranging my bookshelf, I found myself thinking of you…

how I could compare you to a book—but not just any ordinary one.

I’ve read you over and over again.

I know you by heart—every line, every pause,

as if your words have been etched into my memory

from too many quiet revisits.

You could be a book of poetry,

the kind that touches the soul so deeply

it turns into music,

the kind you whisper under your breath

until tears gather softly in your eyes.

Or maybe you are a novel to me,

one of those stories where the end of every chapter

leaves you restless,

aching to turn the page,

just like the feeling I had every time I saw you…

counting days and nights,

waiting for the next moment we would meet.

You could be a romantic story,

full of chaos and rise and fall,

the kind you can’t abandon,

because you need to know

if, in the end, they find their way back to each other.

Or perhaps a tragic one,

with words heavy enough to ache inside the chest,

ending in quiet sorrow,

or even a story so deep

its ending is left unwritten,

meant to be understood differently

by every heart that dares to read it.

To me, you are all the books I’ve ever owned,

and even the ones I’ve never read.

So precious

that I never let dust settle on you,

so carefully kept

that when opened,

you still carry the scent of something new.

A book placed on the highest shelf of my library,

or hidden within an ancient, treasured collection.

But what was I to you?

Which kind of book did I become?

You learned so much from me…

yet perhaps I was too heavy a read for you,

too complex to hold onto.

Or maybe I was one of those dramatic stories

that weighed too much on your heart,

or even the one you once said soothed your soul.

I don’t know which one I was…

perhaps all of them, at once.

But you,

you took me down from the highest shelf

and placed me somewhere in the middle…

or maybe even lower.

You never truly measured my worth.

You read me,

and then set me aside.

But a book that changes you,

a book that teaches you something real—

that kind of book is meant to be kept,

to be returned to,

to be touched again,

and read more carefully the next time.

because maybe, the first time,

you rushed past its deepest truths.

But you…

you folded me,

no, more than that,

you crushed me shut,

and you left.

And now I wonder,

is there someone

who will read you with patience?

with gentleness, word by word?

Is there someone

who will know you by heart

the way I do?

And yet…

you never grew old to me,

my favorite book.

Ashley the name you gave me