The Forwarded Video

Some endings come with betrayal.
Some with distance.
Some with time.

This one came with… a forwarded video.

A religious lecture.
One of many he’d sent me over the years.
I usually ignored them.
Not out of disrespect — just because I knew what they were:
messages not for conversation, but for correction.
And that wasn’t what I needed.
Not from him.

So one morning, tired and annoyed, I replied:
“You know I don’t read or watch any of this stuff, right?”

I thought it would end the stream of content.
Instead, it detonated everything.

What followed wasn’t silence.
It was a text war.

He accused me of drifting from faith.
Of living a party lifestyle.
Of being on a path that would lead to sin… and worse.

And the thing that hurt the most?
He knew none of that was true.

He knew who I was.
What I stood for.
What I didn’t do.
And still — he reduced my entire identity to the fact that I didn’t practice like him.

I wasn’t offended by religion.
I was offended by judgment.
By the assumption that my relationship with God had to look like his.

That’s my line.
Always has been.
Even with family.

Because faith is personal.
And if you don’t honor that…
you don’t really know me at all.

I said something like,
“Don’t speak to me about this again.”

I meant it in a stay in your lane kind of way.
What I didn’t expect…
was for it to become don’t speak to each other ever again.

And that was it.

No apologies.
No mending.
Just a door that closed and never reopened.

He’s the only person I’ve lost like that.
No reconciliation.
No real goodbye.
And years later… I still think about it.

I’ve searched for him occasionally.
Social media.
Old contacts.
Nothing.

It’s like he disappeared.
Like the friendship was quietly erased... but the ache stayed.

I didn’t win.
There was no vindication.
Just the sting of knowing that someone I once called a friend decided I was too far gone to reach.

And I stopped fighting.
Not because I gave up — but because I knew that even if I won,
I’d lose myself in the process.

I don’t regret standing my ground.
But I do mourn what was lost.

Peace didn’t come in the form of closure.
It came in the form of a hard boundary, followed by silence.
Not perfect. Not pretty.

But necessary.

Because sometimes you don’t need to be right.
You just need to be free.