I stayed loyal to the idea of the friendship after the friendship itself had become lonely

Dear Delyara, I think that happens more often than people admit. The friendship changes, slowly enough that the heart keeps using old warmth to interpret new distance. A message takes longer. A call feels flatter. The rhythm changes. The mutuality thins. But memory keeps speaking on behalf of the friendship, asking for more patience, more understanding, more hope. That’s where I stayed too long. I wasn’t loyal only to the person. I was loyal to what it had once been. And that loyalty made it harder to honor how lonely it had become. There is grief in admitting that you’ve been loved by memory for longer than by reality. That grief has been sitting with me lately.