lovely *UNFINISHED*

Everybody out there has experienced love before.

Every single human in this entire universe, and the saddest part is that most of them experience it, but they don’t understand that in order to appreciate it, they must open their eyes and recognize it first.

These are the stories of a few.

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            Nothing is as exhilaratingly breathless as falling in love with someone at exactly the wrong time. Falling in love with someone when you are sixteen years old is so horrid, so meaningless, because how can it mean anything when there are people all around that are older than you and haven’t had the faintest taste of marriage?

            You know logically in your mind and even in the tiniest part of your heart that this can’t be your soul mate, it isn’t plausible. God wouldn’t put you two together at this time if this was the person you were supposed to be with for the rest of your life.

           It isn’t supposed to, but it feels so right. It feels like everything you’ve imagined love to be. You love her lips, even when they’re chapped. You love her nosy hands, and the way she chews her fingernails. Her feathery brown hair. Her skin soft as a butterfly’s new wings, breakable as china. You love the way she’s always cold, the way she complains about the chill like all girls do. She’s adorably clumsy. She makes you give her piggyback rides all the time, but you can’t think of the word “no” when you’re around her. You would do absolutely anything to make her smile. Literally anything, because no mountain seems too difficult to climb as long as she’s waiting for you at the top.

            Somehow school and friends and even family slip into the back of your mind. She’s all you need. She’s like the first snowflake; unique, beautiful, shaped like a star, and as refreshingly cool as the winter sidewalk.

            You spend every waking moment together. In your bed playing with her hair, gazing out the window at the coarse green leaves as they change to brown and fall. Smiling as the trees have forced everything into a pink snow globe and all of a sudden it’s hot and you push off the blanket.

            She blinks and smiles. When she turns to look at you, that’s when you know. This is the girl you can’t imagine parting with, and it takes every ounce of your strength not to beg her to love you forever.

            Saying the words takes a day’s worth of energy and every single bit of individual self you have. You’re no longer your own; this is what it means to be truly selfless.

“I love you.” Her words linger in the air, each moment blowing them up like the balloon animal you were too afraid to admit you weren’t too old for.

Don’t you know how to speak? No, you don’t, because any word that isn’t repetition of her announcement is a breath wasted. When she opens her mouth in surprise, you blink and all of a sudden the door is slamming shut.

Her tears can’t match yours, and you believe you only have yourself to blame. Little do you know the tragic flaw of the world: to believe in love, to be a lucky one who takes it seriously, is not the way to win. No, because to believe is to romanticize and to romanticize is to understand perfection so thoroughly that you take earth’s best shot for granted. Everything tries and everything fails. Yes, you loved her, but your hope for the future ripped you away from the best present you ever had. 

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Loving someone who will never love you back, ah, now that is a love with a strength to turn the earth.

You love him and he doesn’t love you, how tragic. How cliché.

You try with all your might to close your eyes and not see his face. He smiles at you with eyes deeper than any ocean you’ve ever swam in, with dimples more precious than a baby’s, with every flaw an asset.

He’s everything you’ve ever wanted, but you are terrified to admit that this is so. Your heart flutters in your chest when you hear someone say his name, and when you see him you feel the high of a poisonous natural drug. You love him and it’s killing you.

Conversations last a lifetime, yet they are over before you can flutter your eyelashes.

The longer you’re with him, the more it hurts. You love him so much you would hold your last breath if it meant you could stare at him a moment longer.

His music is terrible. Awful, really. He has the most cliché hipster taste in music you’ve ever heard but you feel your criticism twist and turn about like the chord progression in his favorite song when he watches you listen. No one else gets away from your scathing tongue like he does.

He brings his girlfriend and you wish only to claw her eyes out. She’s pretty, she has a great personality. They met at a coffee shop. She was his barista and his coffee order (mocha frappe no whip with room) was exactly the same as hers. How fantastic.

When he admits to you that he doesn’t love her, the hope burns its way through your system and you almost tell him how you feel until he admits he’s in love with someone else. And her name doesn’t matter. All that does matter is it isn’t your name.

When you get home, your tears fall until your pillow needs to be wrung out. It hurts, it hurts like nothing you’ve ever, ever felt before. Yet you still won’t admit it. You like him a lot. Care about him a great deal. Would do anything at the drop of a hat if you knew it was him that needed it. But no, you don’t love him. Love is a word reserved for passion, beauty, the future. He’s just another boy and your soul mate is still out there, pristine, perfect, and waiting for you. 

the path less

APRIL 14, 1997

                There’s a path behind both of our houses, and it’s one of our favorites. Sometimes, we just like to walk along it, and I swear there’s nothing better. She points out all of the little things, pulling me along and never letting go of my hand. I wonder what it feels like to be excited by the same moss on the same tree each time I see it, but I don’t think I can truly understand because I will never truly be able to see through her eyes.

                Margot is the name of the little girl who is my neighbor. Her parents both work ten hour shifts each day to pay for the house and the tuition for her brothers’ college. It isn’t fair to her because she is just as special as they are, even if she was born a little bit later and little bit less planned.

They trust me to babysit her every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday after she comes home from preschool, and each day she tells me with the enthusiasm only a four-year-old can have about the games they played or the letters they learned.

We like to take walks on days neither of us is too tired, and sometimes we pack a sandwich for dinner and simply stay outside and explore. Our favorite game is I spy, and I think that she will grow up to be a brilliant scientist or something, because she is a child prodigy. I know I might be prejudiced, but sometimes I truly cannot see a single flaw in this beautiful child.

NOVEMBER 17, 2000

                There’s a path behind both of our houses, but sometimes it’s simply too cold to walk along it. Weather here in Wisconsin plays quite a part in our lives, because the winters can be quite brutal.

                Third grade has made Margot a little bit different, but I suppose we always knew that nothing can last the trials of time without an ounce of change. She has more homework than we’re used to, but it’s nothing we can’t figure out if we sit down and think about it.             Occasionally I ask her to walk along the path with me, and she is always up for an adventure. But the moss on the trees is less exciting than the squirrels that scamper quickly up so high it appears they’ve entered a new universe.

She still holds my hand, because you never can tell when a root might jump out and try to trip us, and she trusts me to keep her safe, like her parents trust me to watch her more often.

OCTOBER 17, 2006

                There’s a path behind both of our houses, but we only go when the day is warm enough.

                Seventh grade is kind of tough on Margot. She comes over each day after school because there are so many trials of middle school that I simply did not know about. It makes me happy that she wants to share her life with me, and I hope each day that she will always have something good to add to her tales of woe. She always seems to find a little bit of sunshine because she hates to see me frown.

                Little does she know that she is my sunshine.

JUNE 4, 2009

                There’s a path behind both of our houses, but with freshman year coming to a close, we haven’t found time to walk on it in quite some time. Margot has so much to do, she’s part of six different clubs that she’s told me about, and I just don’t know how she does it.

                Every other Thursday seems like a small amount of time to get to spend with Margot, but I don’t know how I could ever judge the time we have together, it’s too precious.

FEBRUARY 16, 2010

                There’s a path behind both of our houses, and sometimes Margot asks if she can go there alone. She always pleads with me to wait for her, but I’m not sure why. She knows that I would wait a millennium if it meant I got to spend precious time with her.

                She doesn’t ever talk about her family, and I haven’t heard much about her friends from last year, but it seems she’s found someone more worth her time—a boy. I fear she is spending too much time with him, since she can only come one or two Thursdays a month, and she doesn’t spend as much time with friends, but I have never been one to meddle, I’m more of a passive listener.

               

SEPTEMBER 8, 2011

                There’s a path behind both of our houses, but with my move I haven’t been able to get there in quite some time.

                It’s the beginning of Margot’s senior year, but I haven’t heard anything from her about college. She never has been the planning type though, and I know that her advisors and everyone at school will help her more than I can, so I try not to worry.

I hope she enjoys her visits with me, I know it’s tougher with me in a farther location than a five minute walk. I love when she comes to talk to me, but she doesn’t smile as easily as she used to. I have to crack a lot of jokes to even get an acknowledgement. She stares off into space quite often, and I wonder what she is thinking. I hope she’s okay, but she never tells me what’s wrong, and I can’t see her as often as I’d like, what with her being so busy and me being stuck with no transportation.

MAY 17, 2012

                There’s a path behind both of our houses, and I am walking along it today. It’s the day of Margot’s graduation, and I grip the piece of paper and pencil, gritting my teeth through the arthritis and walking to our bench.

                I don’t know what to write, but all of a sudden I feel a raindrop slide gently down my cheek. Suddenly the words start to flow and I realize the rain is coming from my eyes. I don’t know how I will get the words out, but I know that for Margot’s sake, I have to write.

Something is resting on my bed, and it hurts to realize I didn’t see it coming. The warning signs were evident when she said premature goodbyes and gave all her possessions away, and  I wonder with numbness why she didn’t think I would protect her. I wish only to hold her hand one more time and protect her from the roots that nudged their way into her brain. A life given up is no guarantee for eternal salvation.

She’s gone but it’s not the way she should have left.

Because today is her graduation and I’m writing a eulogy instead of a congratulatory speech.