My friend, he fell in love one day. He didn't know how, or when but, it just happened. He didn't know why, he just knew that he had the image of the girl he met, a long time ago, etched in the back of his mind. I asked him what love is, and he told me;
Love is the way I can't help but look at her when she walks into a room. It's the way she talks, the way she moves, ever so elegantly, like she isn't even trying. It's the way I can't stop thinking about her smile, even when I have a thousand other things to do. Love is the day I first talked to her, and the way she said my name. Love is the way she told me she loves me too. It's the way we both knew we were falling deeper and deeper for each other everyday. It's the way that we spent all day talking to each other. Love is the way she made eggs and coffee every morning, the way she folded my laundry. It was the way she cared for my parents. Love was the way whip cream stuck to her nose when she drank hot cocoa, or the way her smile brightened up my crappy days. It was the way I could picture her chestnut brown eyes, the bright red lipstick she always wore. how she brushed her dark hair, up into a ponytail because she thought it got in the way.
I always thought she was the most beautiful woman.
Love was the day I asked her to marry me. The day I got down on one knee, by the ocean, where I told her I loved her for the very first time. It was the day we got married. But then, love changed.
Love was the morning when she decided she didn't want me anymore. She told me she loved me but she didn't want me. It was the day that she told me that she didn't know what she felt. It was the day she said she couldn't do it anymore, whatever "it" was.
She was scared of commitment, said she. Love was the way she walked out of the door and didn't even think to look back. Love was the way that I sat on the edge of my bed, crying, trying to think of ways to forget about her. Love was building up the courage to walk into that court room, and signing our divorce papers, only because I knew she would feel happier without me. Love was the way that I tried to hurt myself, just so that I could feel human again. Love was the way that I was a madman, thinking about every single, little detail on her face.
Love was the day I finally decided to call her. —the number you dialed is incorrect, out of service or does not exist.
And then I saw her, in her favorite plaid shirt, on the arm of a new man. Love was the way she smiled when she looked at him. It was the way she brushed back her hair and laughed when he picked her up, the way I did when we went into our first house together. Love was the way I held myself back from screaming out her name when I saw her. It was the way I felt my heart pounding in my chest, the way I found myself short of breath, mouth dry. Love was finding the bright red lipstick she wore, under my bed.
Love was an illusion. Love changes. Love is temporary, love ends, love hurts.
