Oh Abbie, dear Abbie.

A long time has passed since our first encounter.

I met you when my English was still a toddler learning to walk, when I was still washing dishes and no one knew I was much more than that, nor did they imagine that I would soon be running my own business thanks to a partner who believed in my abilities even before seeing what I could do.

Abbie worked as a waitress in this elegant restaurant near Bournemouth, where I live. She was the niece of the owner of the whole company. At the time, I had just arrived in the UK and struggled to understand the interpersonal dynamics, but I knew how to make my mark and the people around me quickly realised my value.

Abbie was sunny, dynamic, she talked to me even though I understood half the things she said. She didn’t shy away from my ignorance. Even when I tried to answer, and struggled to complete a sentence correctly, she made an effort to understand. Many, I assure you, would not waste their time with me, and would immediately cut the conversation short.

I used to work in a room set aside for washing dishes, cutlery and whatever came in from the kitchen or the bar. And I remember Abbie would enter this small room humming or saying aloud ‘Amazing, this is amazing’, something I later copied from her, and which became a bit of a motto of mine during the most difficult services or the most stressful moments.

In short, our friendship was consolidated after a while. And I remember one day she comes in confessing that she has a crush on me.

I really didn’t understand. She had used a non-ordinary expression, which destabilized me. When I revealed to my friend what she had said to me, then I understood.

When I told her that we could talk about it, that maybe we could go out, it was already too late.

My colleagues (but this is a story I’ve heard later) didn’t want her to go out with me because I had just arrived in the UK, a non-native English speaker with low level proficiency and other rumours I am unaware of.

The last night I went out with the Staff group, which was the last night for both of us, as I had found another job and she had finished the season, so Abbie was going home (wherever that was), I had already given up hope on us.

The cheerfulness that had characterised her and the care she had for me over the past week had thinned. I had no voice and really didn’t know how to change the situation.

So, knowing that she was going to leave anyway, feeling like a stranger in a foreign land, I let things fall apart.

That evening, I flirted for a while with another of our colleagues during our excursion to a local pub. I didn’t want to, but the colleague kept capturing my attention letting myself be hypnotized like a fool. Although I kept thinking about Abbie, I already knew at that point that someone had tried and succeeded in pushing her away from me.

Then, the group splits up and I clearly stay with the other one. After a while, however, I decide to leave and look for Abbie. I was annoyed at the thought of not being able to talk as I wanted to with her, spending that evening together, as she had always been so kind to me. Finally, I find her in a nearby pub with other colleagues. Her face is flushed because she has been crying. When I try to understand the reasons for her crying, one of our colleagues separates us saying that she is just sad because she was leaving the next day.

I knew this was not true. I knew even before I felt her gaze on me, those blue eyes that contrasted with her white skin. That look said: Please don’t go away.

But I did go away.

If this had happened a year later, I would have handled the situation much better, but without a good articulation of English, it was difficult for me to communicate clearly at the time. I suffered because of that.

She left the next day, and I said goodbye to my colleagues because I was about to embark on a new path.

There was nothing more between us, neither a promise nor an exchange of messages, we fell into oblivion like frail rock.

It was the summer of 2018.

I start work on a new café. A new team, new management. I’m happy because the vibes are closer to my personality, plus I’m making new friends.

A couple of months later, a colleague comes down to the cafe’s Lab saying that someone came to visit and asked for me.

I thought it was Marco, my best friend, but to my surprise it was Abbie.

Words fail me. I swear. Seeing her that day was like the apparition of an angel.

Abbie had no obligation and no reason to be there. I had been glacial towards her that last evening and had not even been able to talk to her to make up for my ignorance of language.

I should have tried.

And the fact that she was there made me feel stupid and weak.

I say to the manager I’ll be right back in five.

Abbie and I sit on the bench outside the café.

She is very beautiful. I tell her.

Still can’t express myself well, but I talk better, I can handle a simple dialogue.

Abbie reveals to me her cousin is out and about in Boscombe and thought she’d come alone to say hello.

I appreciate it, and I tell her.

The truth is, I’m so confused and bewildered by what’s going on that I struggle to hold the conversation.

I offer her tea because that’s what she wants.

Besides, I can’t stay long.

We talk for a while, about university, about her parents living abroad, etc.

I listen. I nod.

Then the cousin arrives.

I can’t stay, it’s already been fifteen minutes and that’s more than the time limit for a break. Rules.

I go back to my work. I am still amazed that she is there. I want to tell her not to leave, to meet me that evening, but I lack the courage.

So, I tell a colleague to put whatever my friend and her cousin order on my bill. I decide not to show up. I write her a message saying that I can’t come back because I have work to finish, and we are busy. The last part is true, but I could have gone to her. I chose to be a coward. I chose to lose her. Back then, I thought I could message her on Instagram the next day, which I did.

Except that nothing else happened.

I lost Abbie because I was a coward.

She had rare qualities, and I rejoiced in her uniqueness whenever she appeared in my life, whether it was at work or to come and see how I was.

Sometimes we let go, and we are let go. Other times, we are the ones who miss opportunities that were served to us on a golden plate.

I would like to say this to you, dear Abbie: thank you. Thank you for the solid and unusual joy you promote without expecting anything in return. Thank you for both talking and listening to me even though I had difficulties in communication. Thank you for believing in me. Thank you for coming to see me. Thank you for all the “This is Amazing” that cheered me up from my tiredness. Thank you for sitting next to me the first few times when we gathered with the other colleagues, because you knew that I would not be uncomfortable. Thank you for moving your curly hair to the side whenever we spoke, spreading yourself like a delicious perfume. Thank you for the drinks you brought me when no one else could because there was too much chaos around us. Thank you for talking about me to others and saying good words. Thank you for all those intervals you gave me your time, and forgive me for letting you go, I was afraid, I was a coward.

To this day, I really haven’t met anyone your equal.

But, as I wrote in another article, when we are faced with situations that we failed to handle better or missed opportunities, we must move on.

Abbie, again, thank you. Thanks to you I now know what I like most in a woman, and it was you who taught me that. You showed me a path inside my heart that I had been obscure to me until then. Me, who always ended up in problematic relationships, coming out of them thickly broken. And even after you, after all, I continued to make mistakes, ending up in bed with heartless people, who only saw me as a body to be used. But even in the face of that, year after year I continued to think of you and for a while now, I have decided that I know who I am and what I want, so I will no longer allow another woman to use me.

You were worth it.

I’m worth it.

I often listen to podcasts and interviews. I remember an answer Steve Harvey gave to a girl who was struggling to find the right person. She was with a guy and kept changing partners over the last few years. At the time, Steve told her (I don’t remember the exact words, but this is the summary) that we always complain that we can’t find the right person, but the truth is that when the right person does appear we are often busy with others. So, the right person will leave because they see us with someone else, with people we are not deeply involved with and who are only there to fill our loneliness.
Sometimes circumstances do not help, like my story with Abbie and Icy Girl. Sometimes we are not willing to sacrifice our comfort zone and we miss a chance, as happened with Leia.

Many of the people I know, are in unloving relationships, you can easily identify such scenarios, and I am very sad about that, because although I understand that it is a difficult world, our lives are for that reason unique; we should have the courage to try instead of being afraid of taking a wrong step. Those who have succeeded in life have dared, and lost so much, finding themselves on the edge of the precipice, but gaining a greater freedom than ever before.