I don’t speak French, but apparently they don’t say ‘I miss you’. Instead they say ‘tu me manques’ which means ‘you are missing from me’.
Somehow it seems more appropriate to say that. Like, ‘I miss you’ is kind of meaningless. It has no context. I miss you compared to what? Compared to the pot of chocolate ice cream that I downed last week in one sitting? Compared to the pain when I broke my toe a decade ago? No; it means nothing.
But ‘you are missing from me’ somehow far seems more lovely. It is like saying ‘you are a part of me and you are not here’. It’s like telling someone that they are essential to you. Like suddenly finding yourself missing a limb or without oxygen. It says ‘I can barely function without you’ – and that is context.
Because the scariest thing about being apart from someone is that you never quite know if they will come back. You have to let them go to see if they’ll return and you have to hope that they’ll miss you rather than forget you.
Maybe missing someone is your memory falling in love. It’s constantly asking your conscious brain about that person and why you’re not making new memories together. It’s searching for them and reaching out for them.
But whatever. Missing someone. It’s new to me. I’ve never really missed anyone before. It’s quite a nice feeling actually.
