Unsent Letters

I guess what they say is true, friends do indeed come and go. I just never thought that would apply to you, either of you to be entirely honest.

To my cousin:

Despite still being the unsuspecting naïve little thing that I was, I'm not entirely surprised that one of you would actually do this to me. You've always been just like your dad, ultimately. Conniving, secretive, telling people what they want to hear, manipulative, twisting things around to get your way regardless of who it hurts along the way. You use people to your advantage. Hell, you even use your own disadvantages to your advantage. I guess in this instance you won out, if you can call this winning. But just like a broken clock being right twice day, even a loser sometimes gets lucky.

I'm not hurt because you're my cousin. I'm upset because you were my best friend. I'm upset because you were the person I confided in 100%. You were the person I shared everything with, the person I talked to constantly. The person I spent every single day talking to about anything and everything under the sun. Your actions changed my entire existence. I no longer can absentmindedly send you a funny Instagram reel. I no longer need to worry about our dumb snap streak. I know they're trivial things. I know I said I keep snap streaks alive just out of pure spite, and only when they've gotten longer than like a week or so. But these things became so ingrained in my existence for years.

Your choice was a blatant betrayal of our friendship, of my loyalty and respect for you both as my family and my friend. You broke girl code. You went behind my back blatantly hid this from me knowing that what you were doing was wrong. You chose a man over our friendship. A man that you knew I had feelings for.

Your entire life you've always wanted what I had and you've always taken what I wanted. I thought that now, in our adulthood, you had outgrown that. I thought that now, in our adulthood, we were finally past all the childish behavior and we could finally be the friends we've tried to be for years. I guess I was wrong and that's my mistake.

"Family is supposed to be our safe haven. Very often, it's the place where we find the deepest heartache" - Iyanla Vanzant

To D:

You know who you are. You’re the guy who met me on a dating app and started hanging out with me damn near every day for months. You’re the guy who did all these relationship type things with me like cooking entire meals at home with me and washing my dishes and taking me out for drives when I told you I wasn’t having a good day and didn’t feel like being at home but also didn’t feel like being around people either, listening to everything I said and trying to understand me fully and letting me vent about my day at work when I just needed an ear. You’re the guy who wouldn’t let me pay for my own meals and insisted on splitting the groceries because you were at my house so much anyway. You’re the guy who brought me to meet your closest friends and family. You’re the guy that told me losing me would destroy you after the year you’ve had. You’re the guy who tried to comfort my anxiously attached self by telling me you haven’t left yet. You’re the guy who is just the king of mixed signals. You’re the guy who told me you don’t want a relationship, you’re done with dating, you’re done with getting hurt. I should’ve listened to you. I should’ve paid more mind to your use of “yet”.

You’re also the guy who ended up with my cousin instead of me, my cousin being the one person I truly thought was my best friend, the one person who knew absolutely EVERYTHING about how I felt about you and never once uttered a word about you other than to trash talk you behind your back and encourage me toward my feelings for you.

I don’t blame either of you for your feelings. Shit happens and that’s ok. The more I think about it the more I realize I never actually had feelings for you after all anyway, I just liked the attention you gave me and the fact that I had someone I could almost always rely on to be available to hang out with me in my free time. I liked the companionship. And I was always your friend. I was always loyal and I was always there for you, both of you. And instead of communicating and being honest with me, you both went out of your way to lie to me, to hide from me together, and to make me feel like I was going crazy when things started to feel off between us out of nowhere.

I can’t even say I’m upset with either of you to be entirely honest. I saw the chemistry the first time you met and I just tried to fool myself into believing it wasn’t there and she tried to play along with me by encouraging me in my perceived feelings for you. You both showed me your true colors and that’s fine. You are who you are and my naïveté just left me assuming you were different. But what did really upset me was when your sister left a comment on your “hard launch” post saying how the two of you are the cutest "most compassionate" people she knows. Compassionate people don’t lead others on, they don’t send mixed signals, they don’t pretend to be a good friend and make sure you feel safe and secure in your friendship just to abandon you for the first red flag they come across. They don’t start new relationships based on a foundation of lies and deceit. They don't call you a friend while lying to your face.

I’m not upset because you’re with her instead of me. I’m not upset because you didn’t actually have feelings for me after all. I’m not upset because of how you led me on and sent me mixed signals. But I am upset because you were so willing to toss me completely aside so easily. I am upset because I lost my two favorite people as a result of you both preferring to hide in the shadows and keep secrets and just generally be manipulative, deceitful people instead of communicate with someone you supposedly were close friends with. I am upset that I lost the two people I relied on most in my personal social support network because as it turns out, I didn’t really matter to either of you after all.

When I told you she matches the type you typically go for, the type of girl that’s younger with no direction in life, no ambitions or goals or plans or anything, the type of girl who bounces from relationship to relationship because she simply cannot bear to be alone with herself, the girl who is quite literally just made of red flags, who will end up hurting you in the long run so then you’ll be able to once again turn around and say “I told you so, the universe just has it out for me. I guess I’m not meant to be with anyone”, I meant it. She is my cousin and she was my best friend. I know her better than you ever have and I know our family, our history, all of it. I loved her, but I also know she’s not good for you. I hope you both realize what you lost and I hope you both get the relationship you deserve out of it. Good luck.

In summary

I should've seen it coming, hindsight is 20/20 after all. But enough of that nonsense. It shouldn't have to have been on me to guess or figure out what was happening. I thought you both were different. I guess when they say opposites attract, what they really meant is that birds of a feather flock together. Maybe I am overreacting, or maybe I'm just setting boundaries for how I expect friends -- and family -- to treat one another. So it's not really "see you later" anymore, it's goodbye.

No more tears because I didn't lose you, you lost me.