I knew a girl, and we were both in our early teens. We fell in love, and it was the first time for both of us.
Our families were friends, and when it came time to leave, I would cry quietly against the car window, on the ride back home because I missed her as much as kid could. And she would cry at home and no one ever could understand why.
As we grew up, our bond never broke. We always sought out each other, as teenagers many times would. But we never really knew how to express in words what we so clearly felt in our hearts. We were too young. So we would just cry when we were apart, and smile endlessly when together.
10 years later, we were both in that marriage age, and we thought this would surely happen, and that we would come together.
Before I could propose, she got a proposal from a close friend of their families. And she had to accept, for all the reasons our culture knows so well. However, she was unhappy and would cry uncontrollably all the time. Her family thought she was just nervous.
She and I would endlessly look across the room everytime our families were together, and I knew exactly what she wanted me to do. But out of respect for the families I would not.
And then one day, her engagement broke, for completely different reasons. Without saying anything, she turned her broken heart to me. And for almost 2 years, I helped heal it as best as I could.
I was finally got the oppty to propose to her, until I found out one night accidently, that her there existed between our two families, something that would eventually betray this marriage, and hurt her most in the future.
I did not propose, and she never understood, though I explained. I watched her get engaged again, and eventually married. It was the hardest thing in the world to walk away, but it was so that she would not be hurt greater, at least one more time, a lesser of two hurts.