I used to think love had to be loud to count. That it had to come with declarations and certainty and all the things movies make look easy. But what I felt for him never moved like that. It was quieter. Slower. Something I carried like a secret I didn’t want to ruin by saying out loud.

There were moments I could feel him without even turning my head. I’d know when he walked into a room. The air would change. My breath would catch. And still, I stayed on the other side. Not because I didn’t care. Because I cared so much it made my hands shake. I didn’t trust what I’d say if I opened my mouth, and I didn’t want to give him something he didn’t ask for.

I grew up learning how to read between the lines. How to feel the shifts in someone’s tone before they even looked at me. I knew how to love from a distance, because closeness had always come with a cost. So I watched. I remembered. I paid attention to the smallest things. How he paused before answering hard questions. How he tugged at the edge of his sleeve when he was nervous. I noticed it all.

There was this part of me that wanted to say something. That wanted to ask if he ever felt it too. But I didn’t. I convinced myself it was better to protect what was there than risk it with words. I told myself love could be enough, even if it lived quietly in the background.

Maybe it was.

Some people fall in love and it turns into something big and visible. Mine lived in the silences. In the glances. In the way I never stopped caring, even when I stopped showing it. I never needed him to know the full weight of it. I just needed to know that I had felt it. That it was real, even if it was never returned.

And maybe, in some way, keeping it quiet was my way of loving him the best I could. Without asking, without pushing, without expecting him to hold something he never agreed to carry.

Not all love is meant to be spoken. Some of it is just meant to be felt.