always thought that if she loved me the way I loved her, she would’ve come after me. She would’ve responded to me. Her phone number had been disconnected, all her social media accounts deleted. I’d tried to find her for months afterward, tried to remind her that I was still there. Still hers. And I thought I had. I thought she’d known and just didn’t care, hadn’t responded. I thought that if it had been her parents keeping her away, she would’ve come to find me after she turned eighteen. Thought she would’ve come when her grandmother’s health took a turn. When she died. But Darby never did.
