The One Who Got Away (2025)

On the Second Avenue bus in 1981, during my last year of law school, I made eye contact with a handsome man about my age. We spent the rest of the long ride taking not-so-discreet glances at one another. When I got off at my stop at 34th Street, he waved goodbye sadly. The next week, there was a personal notice on the last page of The Village Voice that read, “Second Avenue bus, 34th Street, you got off, I waved. Call me.” I never did, and I regret it.

– Marybeth Kass

69, Holyoke, Mass.

I saw him at a party. He was so handsome, and I smiled at him. We dated for a year. I was in love with him, but I never knew if he loved me. He graduated from college and got a job far away. I moved on and got engaged. A few weeks before my marriage, I received a letter from him. He said he loved me.

– Susan

81, Lansdale, Pa.

He was my roommate in the Navy. We did everything together and thoroughly enjoyed each other’s company. I knew he was gay, but didn’t really know I was for another 10 years. I still think of him often. I tried once to find him, but his name is too common. I think we would have had a wonderful life together.

– Ronald Babb

72, Tacoma, Wash.

I was on a 3 train, riding home from work and reading a thick paperback. Across the car from me was a handsome man in wood-framed glasses reading the newspaper. We made shy eyes at each other all the way into Brooklyn.

At Bergen Street, he stood to get off. I was still four stops from home. He made a gesture: “You coming?” I wasn’t brave. I watched him standing on the platform, watching as I disappeared. “Why didn’t you follow him?” a woman next to me said. The rest of the car hummed their agreement. I got off at the next stop and went back, but he was gone.

– Hannah Blechman

34, Los Angeles

My first experience of love came at age 65. It was electric, magnetic and joyous — love at first sight for us both. Two glorious weekends followed, and then he ghosted me. Later, I found out that he sold his business, packed up his belongings and moved to Florida to be with his son and family, due to a terminal diagnosis. I never found love again.

– Debra Turkat

73, New York City

He was my first true love, but at 21 I dreamed of someone with more ambition, curiosity, zest for life. I kept him at bay, even when he called to tell me he didn’t know how to live without me. I married twice, had kids, tried different jobs, moved around, divorced. I learned along the way my first love actually had been just right. I heard he never married. One of the last things he gave me was a mixtape. Whenever I hear Bob Dylan’s “If You See Her, Say Hello,” I think of him and cry.

– Melissa O’Brien

59, Peru, Vt.

I was a shy late bloomer, and my high school boyfriend helped me open up. I was hellbent on leaving our small southern Indiana town, and he had to stay for family reasons. While I was attending college in Chicago and dating someone new, I wished my ex a happy birthday. He asked to connect and catch up, but I didn’t reply. Two days later, he died in a car wreck. I’d give anything to reconnect and play the “what if” game with him. Instead I play it with his ghost.

– Mary Jeanette Ennis

28, New York City

When I was 29, I met an Irish woman during a brief business trip to Hawaii. We spent a few wonderful days together, culminating in a kiss under the palm trees and a blanket of stars. We traded post cards until I met the woman I would marry a year later. Now the wife is gone, and I once again found that Irish woman online. She appears to be single, but I’m afraid to approach her after all this time.

– Jeffrey Dugan

64, Columbia, Md.

We were cast to play opposite each other in a musical. I fell madly in love with him during rehearsals. We would see each other every so often and pick up right where we’d left off. Eventually we lost touch. Today, I’m happily married with two beautiful children and a rewarding career far from the lights of Broadway, and still waiting for the day he doesn’t cross my mind.

– Esther

41, Boston

My first month studying abroad in England, I met a handsome guy from Devon who was studying to be an architect. It was love at first sight. On the last night we spent together, before I was to return to the United States, he said he thought he was falling in love with me. During the flight home, I couldn’t stop crying. We never saw each other again. To this day, I think of him as the love of my life. I wish I had followed my heart and never gotten on that plane.

– Jeanne Hartig

74, Pittsburgh, Pa.

He seemed too good to be true: tall, handsome, a brilliant scientist working on finding cures for diseases. Most of all he was kind, attentive and romantic. Me? I was young, foolish and overwhelmed, sure that he couldn’t be real, that someone that wonderful couldn’t possibly love me. So I sent him a cowardly breakup email. He replied, “I was falling in love with you” as he let me go.

– Kristina Dahl

55, Seattle

We were both closeted gay Black men in our mid-20s. I knew I was ready to come out. He was unsure if he ever would. For three months we talked nonstop. We had a date watching planes take off and land at the Minneapolis airport and talked about our dreams and goals. Then we ended it. I needed someone who was going to be out of the closet and live openly. He thought he would be disowned by his family. I think he was the one.

– Matt

41, New York City

When I was in junior high, a new girl came to our school. I had never seen anyone as smart, beautiful or amazing. We awkwardly “went steady,” but it didn’t last. At our 30th high school reunion, I asked her how she remembered our connection. She answered with the kindest thing anyone has ever said to me: “I have a 13-year-old daughter, and someday she is going to ask me what it means to be in love with a boy. I am going to begin by telling her about you.”

– Geoff Badenoch

71, Missoula, Mont.

We dated in college. He took me to scout out climbing routes in the Cascades. I liked how I felt when I was with him. School ended, and we stayed in touch. Ten years later, he had finished law school in New York, and I was in graduate school in Minnesota. He proposed we meet up in Chicago for a weekend.

The day of my flight, I sat at the gate and watched as flights were canceled due to weather, including mine. I will always wonder what might have happened if the winter storm hadn’t thwarted that trip to Chicago 20 years ago.

– Lauren

48, Hopkins, Minn.

She was the first woman I was head over heels in love with — but she was straight, so we became best friends instead of lovers. It was only after I married my partner years later that she told me she’d harbored a crush the whole time.

– Quinn Blais

26, Baltimore

He was a tall, gorgeous, Spanish man with flowing brown hair and spoke no English. I was 14 years younger, working in Spain, and spoke little Spanish. He was diagnosed with cancer. Through hiking, cooking and teaching together in a tiny village nestled in the countryside, we fell in love. My Spanish got better, and his cancer got worse. With no plans to stay more than a few years, I fell in love without worrying about the future. Without having to promise anything to me, he fell, too. He got better, and eventually I had to come home.

– Laurie Hendrickson

34, Mystic, Conn.

I was in the middle of a messy divorce and had no intentions of getting into a relationship. One day, I ran into a neighbor who was with her best friend, Amy. Amy had a joie de vivre that was uncompromising. She had survived a battle with cancer, and then would have a second bout.

On Halloween, she had lost all her hair, but she dressed up as a Raggedy Ann doll in high heels and a silver tinseled wig. I gave her a big hug and told her: You are the first person I will call as soon as my divorce is final.

During pandemic lockdowns, Amy was killed in a car accident. My divorce was finalized four months later — I would have celebrated, but instead I was sad because I could not call to tell Amy “I am ready.”

– Oscar Romero

60, Chicago

I was on the D train reading “Me Talk Pretty One Day” after a long day at work. The girl sitting across from me giggled. I looked up and saw she was nose deep in the same book. We locked eyes, and she smiled. She stood up at the next stop, crossed toward the door and placed a smiley face sticker on my shirt. She leaned over and whispered: “You should have asked.” Then she stepped off the train. I looked for her every night for weeks.

– Ken Travis

50, Erie, Colo.

I was working at a library during university and felt an unexpected spark with a French exchange student. After my shift, I offered him a ride home. I studied French, so we had a dynamic conversation. We spent the night together before he left for France. We tried emailing, but as the months rolled on, I began to date someone else.

Around three years ago — 24 years after our first meeting — I saw his name pop up on LinkedIn. I was traveling to Paris, and we made a plan to meet up. We had changed so much, but I never forgot his eyes. The night flew by. We joked that we’ll have to meet again when we’re in our 70s.

– Lisa

48, Toronto

We met while studying abroad in Australia, living together for two months in a big house with other wildlife researchers. Lying in the tall grass, we exchanged stories about our lives until it felt like we’d always known each other. Once the semester was over, I visited him in New York, but neither of us wanted a long-distance relationship.

A few years later, I invited him to join me on a road trip. When we finally arrived in San Francisco, his parents invited us for dinner. I felt immediately at home but wondered if I would ever see them again.

He came into my life once more in 2022. He was driving across the country and asked if he could sleep on my couch for a few days. This time I didn’t let him go. We’re getting married in July.

– Tess Kendrick

27, Denver