Alone

It’s a wedding, where not a soul knows that your best friend, the groom, was the first gay love you ever had and he married a woman in spite of you. The recepetion feels like standing in a mosh pit, being bludgeoned and beaten but no one ever seeing you. Bleeding internally, you pretend to be the Best Man and hand over the ring which should have gone on your own finger. He looks you in the eyes and sobs softly in remorse. The onlookers believe him to be emotional for his new bride but they could never be more wrong. You watch him vow his undying love for her the way he promised you after basketball practice in 11th grade. His father congratulates him for finally settling down and becoming the man he always wanted him to. His family accepts him now. But he will never accept himself. not the way I accepted him. The look he gives her is not love, it is mourning. He hopes she will end a part of him he doesnt want to accept. In the same room full of loving family and accepting different fates, we are both alone.