Falling in Love and Falling Apart

The first time we made eye contact, my blood rushed. She was ugly and plain but her eyes were dangerous. They were wide and vast, dark and cloudy, like a lake before a storm. I fell into them and the current took advantage of my weak knees and I was sucked under until my lungs collapsed; I didn’t even struggle. I drowned in her eyes.

She was a predator. She never preyed on the weak but even the strong willed could never put up much of a fight against her devouring eyes, but she loved the chase. She deliberately circled the girls, hauntingly, unhurriedly. They were entranced suddenly, just as I was. No one was ever enough of a challenge; she searched for a struggle.

I had been touched before by boys, but that was nothing like the way my skin burned when she touched me. Our passion was almost painful. I ached for her.

She was aggressive, holding my arms down so that I could not protest, burying my wrists in the sheets; our fingers lacing. I gasped as if I had been held under water for far too long. My back arched and my head jerked backwards. Her hands, still entwined with mine, slid upward across the mattress above my head. My control slipped away and I gave myself to her.

She liked to share. Share her lips, her lust, her lies, but never her secrets. Those were for me, a dark ominous burden I was cursed to carry for her.

An almost empty bottle of spiced rum, a fist sized dent in the hood of my car, her bleeding knuckles. “I hate you,” she mumbled as she slammed my bathroom door behind her. “I’M GOING TO KILL MYSELF IN HERE. YOU HEAR THAT, BITCH?” I should have let her. “Please, open the door, I’ll do anything you want.” Silence. I shook the doorknob violently until the lock broke loose and the door swung open. She was lying in the bathtub, wrists bleeding, not heavily. She was smiling and crying at the same time.

She smelled like blood and I could taste it on her lips.

She had the softest, most delicate lips. Her lips hinted at the illusion of vulnerability. I preyed on them. Those lips made their way down my neck to my collarbone. She hesitated, teasing me. I inhaled deeply, savoring every breath, every scent. I lifted my legs straight into the air and she slowly and seductively slid my underwear upward, over my thighs, knees, toes. She hovered over me for a moment and I sensed compassion in her eyes. It was too brief to be reality; the emotion emitted from those eyes was only a delusion, a self-pitying figment of my own imagination.

After I made love to her and she got laid, I fell on to my back, exhausted, and began to dream of our lives together. I could foresee dim lights, a family portrait with a mahogany frame above our fireplace, a welcome mat, one bed.

She tucked my hair behind my ear and sweetly whispered into it, “you should know that this isn’t going to last forever, we’re just a fling.” She smiled and rolled over. I convinced myself that she didn’t know what she wanted, that she would eventually fall for me if I continued to turn my back on her selfishness, her betrayal. I thought that maybe one day she would drown in my eyes if I gazed into hers long enough. I never saw requited love in her eyes, only a hint of lust lingered between us.

She held the cigarette between her thumb and forefinger and gently brought it to her lips. She inhaled as if it were her last breath. The smoke trickled from her smile and tangled itself into the midnight air. She peered longingly at it as it spun away. I imagine that was the way I looked when she left me.

As cliché was it was, I couldn’t sleep for fear of dreaming of her. Another empty bottle of spiced rum, another fist sized dent on the hood of my car, my knuckles bleeding.

The horrific part is, I’d do it all over just to feel love like that again, because I know that I never will.