Love lives loudly on the surface.
Public smiles, practiced laughter,
pictures taken from the right angle,
captioned just right,
to say: See? We’re okay.
But beneath that—
beneath the Instagram filters
and hand-holding at family dinners—
there’s a whole ocean of feeling
no one talks about it.
And that is where love either lives…
or slowly drowns.
Under the surface,
there’s the girl who doesn’t ask for help
because she learned love meant not needing.
There’s the boy who says “I’m good”
while his chest is caving in
from carrying too much pride
and never enough reassurance.
We fall in love with surfaces,
but we stay for what lies beneath them.
We stay for the quiet truths—
the way they flinch at the word “sorry,”
how they sleep with the light on,
how they say “I don’t care” but their hands shake.
There’s so much under the surface:
People loving from places still healing.
People afraid of needing too much,
so they love in fragments, in pauses,
with caution signs around their hearts.
Not because they don’t care—
but because they care so much
It terrifies them.
You say “I love you,”
and they smile—
but under the surface,
a war begins:
Do I deserve this? Will they leave like the rest?
What happens when they see the real me?
Because real love doesn’t just awaken butterflies.
It awakens fears.
Old ghosts.
Echoes of every person who walked away
when things got hard.
And love—real love—doesn’t avoid ghosts.
It says, “Invite them in. I want to know them too.”
Under the surface,
there are memories no one mentions:
A slammed door.
A goodbye that wasn’t really a goodbye.
A mother’s silence when you cried.
A text that never came back.
Those moments don’t vanish.
They sink.
They settle at the bottom of us,
like silt in a riverbed.
And when someone tries to love us,
those old memories rise,
clouding the water.
So when I say “love me,”
I don’t mean the polished version.
I mean:
I love the parts I hide.
Love the part of me that second-guesses compliments,
that pushes you away just to see if you’ll stay.
Love the part of me
I’m still learning how to accept being chosen.
Because under the surface,
I am not always easy.
I am layered.
Contradictory.
Some days, I want closeness.
Some days, I need space.
Some days, I need you to pull me back
when I’m too lost to ask.
Real love is not shiny.
It is tender.
It is staying after the mask slips.
It is choosing them again
when they’re too tired to be charming,
when their walls go up,
and their words come out wrong.
There’s a kind of love
that doesn’t show up in movies.
It shows up in the form of
“I made your coffee the way you like it.”
Or “text me when you get home.”
Or sitting in the car with you
while you say nothing—
but everything is heard.
There are objects hidden under the surface too:
The sweater from someone you used to love,
tucked deep in a drawer.
The old journal filled with questions
you never got answers to.
The necklace you still wear,
though the person who gave it
doesn’t even remember.
Each one holds a story.
A version of love that didn’t last—
but left a mark anyway.
That’s what love does.
It etches itself into the small things
that people rarely notice.
And what about the thoughts?
The ones you don’t dare say aloud?
The “What if I’m too much?”
The “What if they get tired of this version of me?”
The fear that one bad day
will be the final straw.
Those thoughts live deep
And when someone really loves you,
They dive.
They swim through the fog of your doubts,
reach the bottom,
and instead of turning away,
they anchor themselves beside you.
Because love is not just weathering the storm—
it’s choosing to sit with someone
at the bottom of the sea.
Not to rescue.
Not to fix.
But to remind them:
You are not unlovable. Not even here.
Under the surface,
We learn love is layered in patience.
It’s relearning how to trust touch.
It’s watching someone walk toward you
even when you warned them you’re a mess.
It’s learning that “strong” people cry too—
just in bathrooms,
with the water running.
So if you fall in love with someone,
don’t just stay on the surface.
Don’t just memorize their favorite color
or the way they laugh.
Ask them what keeps them up at night.
Ask them what they’re afraid to need.
Ask them where it hurts
when they say it doesn’t.
Because under the surface,
we’re all carrying stories.
The girl who keeps smiling
even though she hasn’t felt seen in years.
The boy who gives everyone advice
but won’t let anyone in.
The quiet one who never asks for love,
but leaves space at the table for it every day.
And under it all,
there’s a version of love
that is so soft, so steady, so unseen,
it could only exist in the places
words can’t quite reach.
It shows up in the way someone
learn your silences.
In how they hold you
without needing a reason.
In how they never make you feel
like your wounds are too heavy to carry.
So when I say
love lives under the surface,
I mean:
That’s where it’s most alive.
In the quiet courage to stay.
In the silent hope to be known.
In the deep, dark waters
where the heart learns how to breathe
without pretending.
