I don't remember when it started to feel distant.
Only that, at some point, it did.
If you ask me now, I could tell you the year. I could even tell you my age back then. But that wouldn't explain anything. Distance never announces itself. It grows quietly, the way seasons change without asking for permission.
Three years had passed when I first noticed it.
Nothing had ended abruptly. We hadn't argued. We hadn't said goodbye in any meaningful way. Life had simply begun to move a little faster than it used to. The kind of speed you don't notice while it's happening, only after you realize you're already behind.
Back then, we lived in the same suburban town. The kind where trains passed often enough that their sound blended into daily life. Where streets looked the same in every direction, and evenings arrived gently, without drama. High school days were filled with routines—after-school hours that stretched longer than they should have, walks home that never needed planning.
I didn't think of those days as important at the time.
They felt ordinary.
Classrooms smelled faintly of paper and dust. Windows stayed open whenever the weather allowed. We lingered after the bell rang, not because we had something urgent to do, but because leaving felt unnecessary. I remember thinking that this was just how things were supposed to be.
When I think about it now, what stands out isn't anything specific she said or did.
It's the way silence felt around her.
Warm.
Unforced.
We walked the same roads so often that our footsteps seemed to memorize the path. Sometimes we talked. Sometimes we didn't. Neither felt strange. I never questioned whether she would be there the next day, or the day after that. It didn't occur to me that this was something that could end.
Graduation came and went without changing much, or so I thought. Schedules shifted. Places changed. Messages replaced presence. I told myself this was normal. That this was how growing up worked.
By the time I realized something had been lost, there was no clear moment to return to.
Seven years passed quietly after that.
The town shrank in my memory. The school became a place I could only picture in fragments—a window, a desk near the light, the sound of a train passing in the distance. I stopped checking my phone for messages that weren't coming anymore. Not out of disappointment, but habit fading into something else.
Now, nine years have passed.
I don't know where she is as I write this. I don't know what her days look like, or whether she still walks with the same energy she used to. Sometimes I wonder if she remembers those after-school hours the way I do, or if they've become just another season that passed without leaving a mark.
I've stopped imagining reunions.
Instead, I think about how two people can share the same time so closely once, and then continue living without crossing paths again. Not because something went wrong—but because life kept moving, gently, without waiting.
If you've ever looked back and realized that something meaningful ended without announcing itself, you'll understand.
Some moments don't feel important while you're living them.
They only become clear
when you realize they're already far away.