My origin story is similar. This girl I used to know who was my age was a family friend, and by that I mean my aunt was friends with her mother. Because of this I would see here at various family functions growing up including birthday parties for my cousins. Of course, I eventually fell in love with her in my teens and she put me in the friendzone and said the same shit to me (“you’ll find someone better than me”). Well it’s been almost 7 years and that hasn’t happened yet. She was the only girl I truly loved, and it wasn’t even lust. It was a pure innocent connection I had with a girl I knew since I was a child, but due to not being attractive enough for her, I had to deal with the pain of rejection along with constantly longing for her. When I actually was talking to her I would try to be her therapist, and believe it or not my advice made her happy (she told me that word for word) but then she also said “You were helping me with my issues because you thought I liked you? Well I didn’t”. I fucking cried after she texted me that shit. Basically I obsessed over this girl for YEARS after because I always had to fucking see her at family functions. Something about seeing a girl that you were so in love with to the point where it made you sick, laughing and talking to my own flesh and blood in the same room as me, made me feel a sense of both longing and hatred. All because she chose a guy who cheated on her over me. I would’ve given that girl everything, and the love I had for her was something I will never get to experience again. I don’t believe I will ever be as happy as I was when I thought she liked me. Years later she’s now at college living it up with a new boyfriend of hers while I rot. I wish I had never known her.