I remembered the first moment I saw her.
She was standing in the nonfiction aisle, holding a book about loneliness.
Her hair was messy, her sweater too big for her, and she looked like she had not noticed how beautiful she was.
I was stunned.
That was what drew me to her.
She does not know she being was seen.
I followed her for a while.
Quietly.
Just observing.
But not in a dangerous way.
Not at first.
I needed to understand her before I say anything.
I learned her name from her coffee cup.
Her routine from the bus schedule.
Her laugh from the open windows of her apartment when she forgot to close them.
I memorized her.
When I finally spoke to her in the library, it felt like fate.
I was not pretending.
I really was reading Neruda.
I love poetry.
And when she said that line about crying, I knew she was mine.
Everything after that was natural.
The way she smiled at me.
The way she told me things she thought were small—her favorite flowers, the way she bites her nails when she's thinking.
But it meant more when she gave it to me.
I loved giving her things before she asked.
I knew she'd had a hard day before she said it.
I saw her shoulders slump as she left work.
I left her a note, just a gentle reminder that someone noticed.
That someone cared.
She asked how I always knew.
I told her the truth: "Because I love you more than anyone else ever will."
And I do.
That was why I had to be careful when she started pulling away.
Changing locks.
Avoiding me.
I was not angry.
I was patient.
Love takes time.
And she was scared, not of me, but of what I represented: someone who saw every part of her.
She had been invisible for so long.
She did not know how to be loved properly.
So I waited.
I watched her sleep sometimes.
Not to frighten her.
Never that.
But to remind myself how peaceful she looked when she didn't have to perform for the world.
I never touched anything.
I just...stayed close.
Once, I left a photo album for her.
A collection of moments.
Proof of my devotion.
She came home and found me sitting there, waiting to share it with her.
She froze.
But I saw it in her eyes.
Relief.
Recognition.
A spark of something I assumed she could not name.
"I have been waiting for the right moment to show you...how much you mean to me.", I told her.
And she sat down beside me.
She smiled.
I think she finally understood.
Love like mine isn't always pretty.
It isn't soft.
But it is real.
And no one will ever love her the way I do.