When I wasn't your's

Noah Bennett first saw her on a sunlit Saturday, the kind of day that felt too perfect to be real. She came crashing into his life—literally—on a yellow bicycle that was far too small for her. Hair wild, socks mismatched, and a band-aid peeling off her chin, she swerved to avoid a squirrel, lost balance, and slammed into his family’s mailbox. He blinked, startled. She stood up without flinching, like she did this sort of thing every day. “You’re in my way,” she said. Noah stepped aside. She didn’t say thank you. That was Lily Carson. She was the kind of girl who made her presence felt—loudly, stubbornly, and proudly. She believed in chasing whatever she wanted, laughing at rules, and never asking for permission. And Noah, even at six, was already the kind of boy who watched the world from the edges. Quiet. Careful. Always observing. They became friends the way only children do—without needing to explain why. She showed up at his doorstep the next day with sidewalk chalk and declared that his driveway needed art. He nodded. That was it. From that moment on, she was always around. When she got a black eye at school, he shared his chocolate milk with her and let her lie that she’d gotten it from falling off the monkey bars. When his goldfish died, she buried it in her backyard and called it a “Viking funeral,” complete with a box like coffin and a poem she scribbled on a napkin. By the time they were ten, they were a pair. Noah and Lily. Lily and Noah. Everyone in the neighborhood said so. “Those two are attached at the hip,” the neighbors would say with a knowing smile. They weren’t in love—not yet. They didn’t know what love was. But they knew they needed each other. Then high school happened. Lily grew into herself in ways Noah hadn’t prepared for. She got braces, lost them, and suddenly had the kind of smile that made boys stumble over their words. Her laughter became sharper, and her eyes held mischief like it was a secret only she could tell. Jason Miller asked her to the winter formal. She said yes. Noah didn’t say anything. He told himself it didn’t matter. That he was just her friend. That she’d come back to him. She always did. But Lily didn’t see him that way—not anymore. Not with all the noise of high school, the parties, the boys, the heartbreaks. Still, every time her heart got broken, she came to Noah. He was the safe place. The fallback. The constant. He carried that role with pride and a quiet ache. Sometimes, when they watched movies and she leaned her head on his shoulder, he’d close his eyes and pretend—just for a second—that she was his. But pretending doesn’t last. By twenty-three, Lily was in love with someone else. Caleb Monroe. Tall. Ambitious. The kind of guy who knew how to take up space. She introduced them one afternoon, smiling like Noah should be happy for her. He smiled. When they got engaged a year later, she asked him to be the best man. He said yes. Because that’s what best friends do. The night before the wedding, he stood outside her hotel room door for fifteen minutes, holding a letter he never gave her. In it, he’d written everything. How he loved her. How he always had. How he never stopped. But he walked away. Left the letter in his jacket pocket and gave a toast the next day that made her cry. Years passed. He got married, too. Mia was sweet, gentle, patient. She loved him. He cared for her. But it was never deep. Never consuming. Never Lily. Then Lily died. A rainy Tuesday. Car accident. Gone too fast, too soon. At the funeral, her husband Caleb handed him a box. “She wanted you to have this,” he said quietly. Inside, Noah found photos, a pressed daisy from their childhood, and a sealed envelope with his name written in Lily’s loopy handwriting. He opened it with trembling hands. > “Dear Noah, You were always there. Always kind. Always quiet. I never told you, but you were my first love. Before Jason. Before Caleb. You were it. But you never noticed me…” Noah sat alone in his apartment that night, letter shaking in his hands, and whispered to no one, “I noticed. God, Lily… I noticed.”