I've just spent the last 3 and a half days reading through this thread and it's wonderful. There are the most beautiful and horrifically sad things in here, and I'm just amazed by some of it.
It's also given me a chance to think about all my many, many mistakes. I'd quite like to give it a go for the 4 girls I have the most to say to. Forgive me the long post.
Dear Girl number 1,
You were my first love, the first serious girlfriend I ever had. You were everything to me, but I had nothing to compare it to. I didn't realise how bad for each other we were. I made some pretty ****ty mistakes, but so did you, it was just neither of us realised it at the time. And we were both far too strong to ever back down, from anything, especially each other given how much we cared about the two of us. The thing is though, even with all that, when we did mutually come to a split due to age and distance, I had hoped we would stay close. You said forever, and I foolishly believed it would happen in some capacity or other. I guess I was wrong.
But, in the end, after so long, I really am over you. I don't look at the outside of your de-friended profile anymore, I don't check whatsapp to see when you were last on and I don't even remember when I stopped checking. I just wonder if you still miss me sometimes. The few feelers I've extended, to be civil, to be friends, to be interested, you've never responded to. I don't love you, not anymore, but I'm curious to know how you're getting on.
Never mind,
Wishing you well.
Girl number 2,
I was halfway through this thread when I realised an anonymous post wasn't going to be enough. I unblocked you and apologised and amazingly you forgave me. You were always better than me. Thank you.
Sorry again.
Girl number 3,
You should probably be the person I hate, you should probably be the person apologising but if we flipped an even coin, I don't know who it'd say is worse. I used you, I admit that. I wanted sex and I wanted to escape commitments, both times, and you were there and you wanted me. That's what it was to me, that's all it ever was to me. We could have been good friends, we enjoy the same comedy, the same music, you fed my ego. But we could never have a relationship, you're a follower, you're a pushover, you let me decide everything. You were utterly weak and contemptible. I kept treating you worse and you kept letting me. Why didn't you stick up for yourself? I admit I was awful though. The most humongous **** I've ever been, in a life of sh*t-filled ****ery. You told me you wanted something extremely casual, as casual as casual can be. I still don't know if you were lying. Either way, me getting with someone else was no big thing. You agreed, until you found out who it was. I'm sorry for that, too.
I tried to start a relationship with the other girl, I was a bit conflicted about it, and I was being very confusing to myself and you and others. But once I decided that I was going to be straight with you both, that I was going to be exclusive why did you tell me you were going to get me back. Why would you want me back?
I put the blame on you, I said you had got with other people first, you'd scuppered any chance of a relationship that you were the one to blame. I lied. I wanted to enjoy our increasingly rare good times but I didn't want to be the one to take the blame. I'm sorry.
But, and here it is, but. How could you? You cold hearted b***h. Your father was dead. My mother was dead. You got me drunk, you took me back to yours as a friend, you upset me and then you consoled me. You kissed me and I said no, and you washed, rinsed and repeated until I gave up. You're f***ing sickening. You didn't just take advantage of me, you didn't just make good on your promise, you whored your father's death. Just so you could what? Ruin my attempt at a new relationship, for some random, average guy you'd slept with twice?
But it's still not your fault. I remember doing it, I remember giving up fighting it that night. I wish I'd had more of my wits about me, I wish I'd not got so drunk, I wish a lot of things. Most of all, I wish none of this had ever happened.
I wish I could forgive you, 'cus I can't ever truly apologise for my causing all this heartache until I stop resenting you for it. And I can't stop resenting you until you apologise. And you can't apologise til I do. Its the most awful thing.
Until somehow, by some magical external influence, this is solved, I'll just wish you good luck and hope you keep away from me. I'm living with your new man now, I hope you stay at your place.
Me.
Dear you, and only you,
When I first saw you, I thought you were the most beautiful woman I'd ever seen outside of a screen. You don't believe me, but I told all my friends that very same night. All of them. You were amazing, utterly amazing. Perfect. And I'm so not. So completely not. So ****ingly and utterly flawed. And you can be a bit reserved, you know that, I thought it was disinterest.
I never had a clue, never imagined a girl like you would be interested in a guy like me and I'm so glad you didn't know me before you did.
As I got to know you, as I learned how intelligent you were, how witty, how strong, how inflexible, how compassionate I ached for you. You spraining your ankle was the best thing that ever happened. You said you liked me before, but I can't be sure, I tried to be like you and I offered my help and you kissed me for it. I was over the moon, I saw my opportunity and I wasn't going to let it slip through my fingers. I wasn't going to spend the next few years of my life looking at you and thinking 'what if?'
After we kissed, you asked if I had a girlfriend. I said no. I didn't lie. She never even came into my head, we were as casual as casual can be. I'm sorry for all the division that it caused. I still don't know why you were blamed and not me, I tried to protect you but I know, with everything that others and I did, those few months were utter **** for you. You who had only ever tried to do good to everyone around you.
I'm sorry I cheated on you.
I told you everything, I gave you space. I committed myself to not messing up again and eventually you, you utterly good woman, decided to give me a second chance.
And it's been fantastic. We're so strong now. This is my longest relationship, yours too, and to look back at how we started, and where we are now is incredible. I'm so honoured, so lucky and as most people reading this will agree, I don't deserve you at all.
Today, an old friend talked to me, from before I met you talked to me. I was the same me I used to be, but when things began to be a little strange, I backed off. I felt guilt for even letting it get close to awkward.
When I was deciding between the two of you, or rather, what I'd try to do. I remember sitting talking to my friends. Most of them advised I go with her, not you. They saw her and I when we were with them and not you and I when we were together. I remember saying "When (her and I) we're together I feel like the guy I am. When you and I are together I feel like the guy I've always wanted to be".
This much further along and the changes are more than skin deep. I will never stop trying to make up to you for the quagmire that was our beginning. I will never stop loving you. I love you as much as, more than, my first love, which I really thought would never be possible, and we're so well suited that it comes without any of the drama.
You are actually the last thing I think about each night and the third thing I think about each morning (after the barely conscious, are all my limbs still here, is there sleep in my eyes, that no-one can really help :P )
Everyone I've ever been with before this has had an expiry date. I've seen a future without them. I can't see, I don't want to see, a future without you.
Stay with me, stay with me through these next few years and I will marry you. I will marry you, I will give you everything and the world and I'll never let you go.
I love you. You're redeeming me and you're so much better than I deserve.
I love you
Me.