I Can't Sleep Because I Keep Thinking About You

It's 2 a.m. and I am wide awake. My phone is lying dark next to me, and I keep reaching for it, checking, putting it back down, then reaching again — even though I know there is nothing from you on it. This has been my routine for the past two hours.

During the day I am fine. I get up, I work, I talk to people, I laugh at the right moments. Nobody would look at me and guess that I still think about you as much as I do. But at night, the guard comes down. At 2 a.m. there is no pretending. Every small memory shows up with a spotlight: the way you tilted your head when you laughed, the song we both pretended not to love, the goodnight text you sent once that I read four times before putting the phone down.

I actually opened our chat tonight. My thumb hovered over the box for a long time. I wanted to send something simple: "Are you still awake?" But at 2 a.m. a message like that never means what it says. It means I miss you. It means I have been thinking about you all evening. It means I am hoping, a little, that you miss me too. And I was not ready to hand you all of that in one line.

So I am writing this instead. Maybe I will keep it. Maybe I will send it anonymously — the kind of message that arrives without a name, so you can read it, and if you want to ignore it, you can, and neither of us has to survive an awkward conversation.

What I actually wanted to say is simple. I still think about you. Not every minute, and not in the way I used to. But when the city goes quiet, you are the person I would still want to talk to. I hope you are okay. I hope whoever is in your life now is good to you. And if you ever wonder whether anyone still cares — someone does. They just never say it out loud.

Send it at 2 a.m. and it reads as desperate. Send it anonymously and it reads as honest. That is the difference this letter is for.

Copy this message (50 words): "It's 2 a.m. and I can't sleep because I keep thinking about you. You don't have to reply. I just wanted someone to know — you're still the one on my mind."