To ask if you'd ever met someone you cannot forget

[Jackfruitburger]

A year ago I left the best job I will ever had. It was in fast paced, catering environment and when I started I was 25. Previously I'd been in corporate businesses and this was the first time I'd ever seen the face of a business owner. I started a few months before the grand opening, painting walls and building furniture.
My kitchen assistant was a beautiful 18 year old who'd only had one job before. He was painfully shy but after three months being stuck in a 2X8 kitchen five days a week, we knew everything about each other. I was eventually moved to front of house but we still worked together two shifts a week, by which time he'd matured a bit.
Our relationship was a bit odd. Generally we just got on really well, but sometimes there was a hint that something else was going on. One day we were sat down, hiding from customers when we discussed going to India together. "What would (your gf) say if we went to India together?" I asked "I think she'd lose her shit. Let's do it."
Nothing ever happened despite us hanging out at staff meals and going to the odd gig together. Once I think I drunkenly fell asleep on his lap. It wasn't meant to be and we both got serious with our partners. He was the first person I told when I found out I was pregnant and I helped him with the house buying process.
When I went back after ML it was never the same. I'd lost that carefreeness and I couldn't drop everything and go out after work like I used to. I found out I was expecting my second one month after starting back so I left again the following year.
I still drop in sometimes and he still messages me but I find it too painful to reply. I can't believe we've turned into 'hey, how's you' acquaintances. We've met up a couple of times with kids and spouses but it just feels strange. I mean, I don't have any other 25 year old male friends. I can't ask if they want to come to soft play!
I haven't replied to his last message but I still feel like I'm recovering from that period in my life. I saw someone on the beach that looked like him and it stayed with me all day. Sometimes I dream that I'm back there. I think it's my mind finding escapism from the mundane and stressful present. I don't think I wanted to be in a relationship with him, we were too similar, it never would have worked. I think I just found a kindred spirit and I miss someone understanding me like that.
Anyone had something similar?

Not to that extent I walked past a guy once who smelt like lemons the cleanest and most wonderful smell and I have never found it again I don't even know who he was

So he is a shy guy and you are ghosting him? You , one of the only people that he made a meaningful friendship with?

Nice.

A little boy I met living on a railway station in Romania. He has nothing but the clothes he stood up in but he was so bright, so full of life. He was maybe 11 years old and asking for work not money. As soon as he heard we were English he followed us everywhere practising the few words he knew. We bought him a meal butwhqt excited him most was the coke can. He refilled it with water and practically swaggered along with it. We only spent a couple of hours with him.but will never forget Tony ( probably not how it was spelt)

I think you are recovering from that period of your life when you were carefree. It's painful to let go and adjust.
Sounds like you had a thing for him too---who said being too alike, doesn't work?
I don't feel you should ignore him.
If safe to do so (no emotional cheating), be friends. Invite him to softplay.

My one time best friend, we met in drama club. He was gorgeous, all the girls after him- and still are, the thirsty Facebook comments on his photos are something else- but we were Just Friends. We told each other everything. We sat in his garden with trance music on and talked about getting motorbikes and touring Japan, about how he worried he would never find love and I was afraid I'd never be good enough for my writing to get published. It started to rain and we got up to run inside but first he grabbed my wrists and we took our shoes off and danced in the rain.

Sometimes we could have had more than friendship. It always felt like a choice we weren't sure about making. The day I went to his and lay on his bed while he was in the shower. I said something stupid- he laughed, came out in a towel and lay down next to me. He tickled me and we play-fought, he knelt over me and we looked at each other for a moment as if wondering, should we?
And then he got dressed and I picked up his guitar.

He went to uni and got a girlfriend. Stopped replying to my messages. I still think about him, but not all the time.

@Rixera that sounds very similar. I think we were always on the cusp of saying something but then not. How long ago was that? Does it get easier? Do you ever see him?
We were both in relationships, actually quite happy in them too, but our partners were similar, both fiery and moody, but ultimately got what they wanted. We were both laid back, prone to laziness and just let them get there own way.

I don't reply to his messages because I feel that he only messages out of sympathy. My confidence is at an all time low, two pregnancies, breastfeeding, sleep deprived snacking have all taken their toll. When I run into him it's awful, I'm always in sweaty, post nursery run, anorak, no make up mode, he has got better looking and I feel like one of his mum's friends that he has to be nice to. I know one day he won't reply to my message and that will be so painful I won't be able to take it.

I do miss my old life although I love my kids. Possibly because I was in a job I loved rather than my new one in private dentistry that I despise. I miss that creativity and being really passionate about things, I feel silly doing that stuff now. But I do miss him, and the feeling of being so comfortable in telling someone everything about my life, without judgement.

OP, perhaps it is a good thing that you are always in sweaty mum mode around him. He is not in your life now the way he was.

It's painful. It has been 6 years since we last spoke, but I have so much to get on with in my life now I don't miss him as much at all. Sometimes, the odd thought. And a smile at how the genuinely swoon-worthy man all those girls are thirsting over once looked at me That Way when he posts a new profile picture (we are talking hundreds of likes from girls. Very beautiful man.) But we don't see each other at all now, even to bump into at the bus stop because I moved away.

I think part of it is general life dissatisfaction for you. Is there anything you can do to make your everyday more interesting?

I had a friend who I met in primary school. In fact he was my 'boyfriend' for about a week in year 4 too 

He was incredibly well liked and popular and we hung around in the same little group until we moved to secondary school, where he found new friends and went on his way. However we still spoke every single night, almost as a secret friendship that nobody else knew about, and we were incredibly close. Even know I look back on those nights fondly.

Sadly, as we moved into adulthood we lost touch. I found him on Facebook a few years back and was devastated to see he had shared pictures and posts from the EDL, and posted opinions that were frankly vile and racist. This does not, in any way, reflect the young man I knew as a child and teenager and I still struggle to make sense of it now.

Needless to say, I won't be getting back in touch and I think he's a monster. But I do miss those chats in a more innocent time.

I met a disabled girl and her family at a party she was aged about 18/19. They were related to someone we knew and I got talking to her and her family.
I’m not sure entirely what her conditions may have been but she was physically disabled and needed a wheelchair all the time, she also had some learning/speaking difficulties .
She had such a zest for life and was making me laugh in our conversation.
She told her dad that she really wanted to get up and dance and my heart just burst because she wasn’t able to but her dad, with a look of absolute love and adoration in his eyes, scooped her up and held her upright so that she could join in and we danced with her. It was a beautiful moment to see the pure joy on her face. Sadly her father passed on and they moved away, We lost touch but I always think of this girl and her family.

I’ve had two of these, in different ways.
One was a guy I met when I was about 16. We were very close, lived in the same street. We spent a lot of time together just talking, getting drunk, hanging out. One of us always had a partner when the other didn’t. There were a few near misses: spin the bottle and we couldn’t stop when it landed on us; me falling asleep in his bed in the early hours of the morning and him holding my hand as he walked me back in the morning, both of us sharing secret smiles; the time we sat on the floor in the almost-dark and he looked at me for the longest time and whispered that I was the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen. In the end, I left for uni and life moved on. We’ve had a few conversations about it since. He says I’ll always be the one who got away. He’s now got a multitude of children and is about to get married to the third mother of his children. 🤔

The other was my soul-mate. He was the male me. We would spend hours and hours talking about everything. I’ve never told anyone some of the things I told him. He’s one of those rare people you meet and they just get you. You feel understood. I would have moved heaven and earth for him. He had a long term girlfriend. I tried to respect that and so did he. After a couple of years, one night he told me he needed to say something but he didn’t want me to reply. I agreed. He said “I wish I’d met you first.” It broke my heart. A couple of months later I made the decision to extract myself from his life because I couldn’t put him in the position of making him choose. A few years later we got back in touch. He was sick but he played it down. We mostly communicated via email. One day he sent me an email and at the end he wrote: “I need to say this and I should have said it a long time ago: I love you.”

Two weeks later he died.

@Writersblock2 @daughterofanarchy these are heartbreaking, thanks for sharing. Did any of you tell your DH's or DP's about these past soulmates?

Yes, my DH knows about them.