A Letter To My Future Guy, Whoever You Are

I don’t exactly know who you are yet. Have I met you? Are we friends? Are you a complete stranger?

I will have no answers to these questions until the time is right for us to cross paths. But I do have one wish. I hope you are doing so much better than I am right now. I hope you aren’t going through a shitty heartbreak. I hope you’re happy and with your heart still whole. But at our age, I don’t think anyone’s heart is still quite as whole as want them to be. So I simply wish that your heart is a little bit more whole than mine. God knows we’ll both need it.

I apologize if I seem so jaded. I never wanted to turn out this way. I never thought I would, because truthfully, the girl you will soon meet and fall in love with is too optimistic for her own good. I honestly believed that my first love would be my last. My one and only. But I learned the hard way that a love of that pedigree is something close to a myth. Sure, miracles happen, but for normal people like us, we have to try countless times before we find the right person.

So I’m writing this letter to let you know that although I am broken right now and all I want is for you to come and help me find myself and put me back together, that isn’t your job. I don’t want you to help me. I don’t want you seeing me at my weakest point for something someone else did. I don’t want you to see me as that tragedy you want to fix and then fall in love with in the process. I am not a charity case.

No, I want you to meet me when I’ve fixed myself. You see, I will not allow you to pay for the mistakes of someone else. The first time you see me, I won’t be a delicate flower wilting away. I will be magnificent. A flower in bloom. I will be golden.

You will fall in love first with my laughter, not my tears. You will fall in love with my dry humor, not my bitter tongue. You will fall in love with my real smile, not the one I plaster on my face so people will stop asking me if I am okay. You will fall in love with the best version of me, not the shadow of the girl who once loved someone deeply. Not the girl I am now.

You will fall in love with the version of me you deserve. I will not allow for you to fall in love with someone who is not ready. Because when I am, you will be showered with a love that is frighteningly beautiful.

So my future love, please be patient. I am fixing myself, picking up the pieces that another person broke. If you meet me and see that I am not yet whole, wait for me. As I will for you if you are in an even worse state than I am now. I am holding on to the hope that we will have our happily ever after.