It's been quiet between us for a while now. I know your world got busy — moving home, closing one chapter, figuring out the next one — and somewhere in all of that, we went quiet too. I don't think that's anyone's fault. Distance does that sometimes, all on its own, without either of us doing anything wrong.

I won't pretend the gap between us — in age, in stage of life, in the pace we're each moving at — never crosses my mind. It does. There will be days I don't fully get what you're going through, and days you might not fully get what I'm going through either. But not understanding everything perfectly has never once made me want this less.

Here's what hasn't changed: I still want to wake up thinking about you. I still want to build a life with you, one call and one visit and one inside joke at a time. I still want to be the person you tell things to — the good news and the bad, the small things and the big ones.

If I'm honest, there's one thing I've been carrying quietly: I sometimes wish you'd be the one to reach out first, every now and then. Not out of pride, and not because I'm keeping score — I just want to feel like I'm still someone you think of first. If we can both hold onto that, I don't think there's a version of us that runs into real trouble.

So, plainly, with nothing to click or fill in: are you still here? Still waiting, even a little? Because I am.

— enough reading. once you finish, call. Dying to talk to you.