Wow. This place still exists.

I'm not going to pretend I haven't been gone for an embarrassingly long time, because you've all got eyes and a scroll bar and you know exactly how long it's been. Life happened, as it tends to do, and this little corner of the internet quietly collected dust while I was focused elsewhere. (No spoilers.)

But I'm back. Probably. Almost certainly. Let's say tentatively-definitely.

To my loyal, beautiful, inexplicably faithful 20-something readers -yes, I see you, all of you -thank you for not leaving. I don't know if it's dedication or a welfare check, but either way I'll take it. You are the reason I'm here.

Anyway. I wrote something. It's about the people who matter to us, and what that costs sometimes. Hope it lands.

It's never a stranger who breaks your heart

A quiet look at the people who get close enough to hurt us

Something unexpected touched me the other day.

Not a person, not even an object. Words. A combination of them that read:

"Not a single scar on my heart came from enemies. They all came from people I thought loved me."

It was on TikTok, I think. And I remember sitting with it for a while - pausing the source, then pausing myself - not because it was touching, but because it told a story. A story that many of us have lived but rarely said out loud.

This is actually what reminded me to pop back here. So blame TikTok if this didn't meet your expectations.

Anyway, back to the topic.

We all know one or two toxic people -egotistical, egomaniacal, vain, narcissistic — the internet has given us a whole vocabulary for these types. But this quote speaks to something more specific than that.

It's not about someone who lost their temper. Not someone who simply grew apart from you.

This is about someone who came in with a plan. The ones who studied you first. Figured out what you needed. Then became exactly that.

They didn't stumble into your trust - they engineered it. Slowly, carefully, sometimes over months or years. They made you feel seen in a way you hadn't felt before, because they were paying close attention - not out of love, but out of strategy. Every kindness had a purpose. Every moment of closeness was an investment they intended to cash in.

And you had no reason to defend yourself, because nothing looked like an attack.

That's what makes this kind of betrayal different from anything an enemy could do to you. When someone comes at you openly, something in you braces. You're alert. Your instincts kick in. But these people — the calculated ones -they come through the front door with a smile, and you hold it open for them. Because why wouldn't you? They seemed like exactly the kind of person worth letting in.

By the time you understand what happened, they're already gone. Goal achieved. On to the next.

And you're left not just hurt, but confused - replaying every moment, looking for the seams, wondering how you missed it. That confusion is part of the wound.

An enemy leaves you angry. This kind of person leaves you questioning your own judgement, your own perception of reality, your ability to ever read a person correctly again. That's a much harder thing to recover from than straightforward hostility.

The cruelest part is that the closeness was real - on your side. The late nights, the vulnerability, the things you said that you'd never said to anyone else. You weren't wrong to feel what you felt. You were just feeling it alone, without knowing it.

That's not a failure of your instincts. It's a testament to how convincing some people can be when they want something badly enough.

And yes, the scars from enemies are real. But they're clean, in a way. You knew the source. You could make sense of it. The scars left by someone who pretended to love you, or befriend you, are something else entirely. They go deeper, they take longer, and they ask harder questions of you.

Which is exactly why we should stop calling it naivety when someone gets hurt this way, and start calling it what it actually is: a deliberate act, carried out by someone who knew precisely what they were doing.

You were not foolish for trusting them. They were skilled at being trusted.

There's a difference.