Writers 
Do I miss them, or do I miss who I was with them?
Sometimes I scroll through old conversations and wonder when we became strangers with memories.
I don't necessarily miss the conversations. Some of them were pointless. I don't miss the arguments, the awkward silences, or the moments when I knew something between us had changed.
Maybe I miss laughing without thinking about how it sounded. I miss having people to tell the smallest things to. I miss the version of myself that believed some friendships were permanent simply because they felt permanent.
And perhaps that's the cruelest part.
You can miss someone without wanting them back.
You can remember the good without forgetting why it ended.
Sometimes, what you're grieving isn't the person who left. It's the person you were before they left.
The girl who had those inside jokes. The girl who had somewhere to belong. The girl who didn't know yet that people could become memories while they're still alive.
Maybe that's why going back never feels the way you imagined.
Because you're not returning to them.
You're returning to a version of yourself that no longer exists.
Thank you so much for reading my prose-poem
