We do not remember time
we remember people
not the dates or the years or
the exact order of things
but the way someone said your name
like it belonged somewhere
like it mattered
we remember the ones who
stayed a little longer after goodbye
the ones who turned
ordinary afternoons into something worth keeping
the ones who never realised
they were becoming permanent
there are entire versions of us
that only exist with certain people
a louder laugh
a softer heart
a careless kind of happiness
that did not check the clock
and now those versions feel distant
like they belonged to someone else
time does not rush past you all at once
it steals in pieces
first the conversations grow shorter
then the meetings become rare
then one day
you are left holding a memory
instead of a moment
and what hurts is not always the ending
it is the quiet in between
the unread messages
the unsaid things
the plans that stayed plans
the feeling that something slipped
and neither of you reached out fast enough
people do not always leave dramatically
sometimes they just fade
softly, politely like a sunset you forgot
to watch and yet they remain
in the way you still expect their message
in the way a certain place feels incomplete
in the way your mind revisits them
at the most unexpected hours
you start to realise
you are carrying entire worlds inside you
inside your chest
live conversations that will
never happen again
jokes that will never be told the same way
silences that once felt full
and still you hold on
not because you cannot move forward
but because some people
were never meant to be forgotten
because they shaped you
in ways time cannot undo
they taught you how to feel deeply
how to care without measure how to lose
without completely breaking
and maybe that is the quiet
tragedy of growing up
not that people leave
but that you learn
how to live with their absence
how to smile at memories
that once would have undone you
how to carry love
without needing it returned
because in the end
memories are not just
reminders of what is gone
they are proof that once
in the middle of this fast,
unforgiving life you found someone
who made time slow down
and even now when
everything has changed
when they are no longer beside you
a part of you still whispers
they were here and so was
and for a moment
that was enough
