He's not interested. Not just in you, but in any girl. He doesn't want a relationship with anyone. He shuts out all potential emotional feelings toward girls. He doesn't let any girl get close enough to his life or his heart. Yet, despite it all, you still like him.
When you first started falling for him, you told yourself to stop. You knew that it wouldn't end well, so you tried to convince your heart to turn around. But every day, you noticed more and more great things about him: the way his dimples show when he's laughing with his friends, the way his hair frames his face, the way he actually listens to what you're saying, and the way his work ethic comes out in his assignments in school. You realized that it's hard not to love someone when you notice so many beautiful things about their personality. Eventually, you gave in and let yourself fall hard.
Now, you can't stop thinking about him. You cling on to the dream that you're the one. Not necessarily his soul mate, but you're the one who will coax him out of his shell. You'll break down the walls that he's spent years building up. You'll be the one that he'll fall in love with. You want him to be unable to resist the feelings he has for you, and he'll succumb to his heart and break the rule so firmly set by his mind.
Sometimes, you blame her, the one who caused this to happen. You've heard the story of how she broke his heart, and you can tell that he thinks of her whenever he sees a girl. You believe that it was one date with her that messed it up for you. You can't believe that she would break such the perfect heart of such a perfect guy. But she's your friend, and when she talks about him, you can tell that she's not over him either. She wishes she could take it back, but you're secretly glad that there won't ever be a relationship between them again.
Despite all that, you still hope. You hope that there's a chance. You repeat imaginary scenarios in your mind. You dream of new what if's. Even when all of his closest friends warn you about the heartbreak and tell you to move on from him, you still hope. Even when everyone you know tells you to stop falling harder, you still hope. You cling on to the hope like it's the last drop of water in the world.
Because you know that if you let go of the hope, you'll let go of the future you've imagined in your head. You'll let go of all the happy memories you've made together in the past. You'll let go of any chance to be there for him now. And this will leave room for the heartache. You'll feel the pain from knowing that he won't love you like you love him. You'll refuse to accept that you just weren't that special for him. You'll wonder why he couldn't see all your special perks and fall for you. You'll spend days, weeks, months thinking about him, him, and him.
But, eventually, the pain will fade. Every day, your heart will hurt a little bit less. You'll wake up one morning and he won't be the first thing you think about. You'll bump into him and make small talk, expecting the familiar ache in your chest that you've become so accustomed to, but it won't be there. You'll find someone else to obsess over. You'll move on.
You'll find new hope. You'll hope that he'll eventually meet someone who will break through his walls and love him even more than you did or ever could. And you'll hope that you don't ever let someone hurt you enough to end up like him: rejecting all love. Because love is the most powerful force in the universe, and to be deprived of that is worse than to be without that last drop of water.
