motivations: love me

Love Me

She picked him out from the sea of 250 psychology students. He was listening intently to the professor - cleverly condescending Professor Harry Mitchell - and jotting down notes furiously as the Powerpoint slides slipped by like subway cars that slid from station to station without care for the desperate passenger who was running late. He looked diligent, consistent. The way he pushed up his glasses hurriedly, as if that one movement would make him miss jotting down an extra sentence, and the way he twirled his pencil between his fingers very deliberately – it was all something very intriguing to her. And so, she liked him.

It took a while before she actually seized a chance to speak to her chosen one.

It was a Friday. There were spots of rain here and there, and once in a while, a ray of sunlight would shine before being quickly covered up by another cloud.
The boy – her boy – was sitting with his psychology textbook open on the library desk; he did not know that she lived for those random rays of sunlight. Especially on days like this. It was like finally having a crush requited after agonizing over him for months of angsty poetry and too-obvious actions like offering to go grocery shopping with him or folding his laundry for him – even if that requitement lasted only a few days of confused feelings.

She was addicted to happiness. And happiness, for her, was love. And love, for her, was undying devotion and unconditional acceptance from that one person who was meant for her. Or if more than one person was meant for her, those few people. She decided at some point that she wouldn’t mind being caught in a love triangle, as long as she was the recipient of those two dueling people’s love. And thus, by the transitive property of addictions, she was addicted to her ideal future man. Or men.
And though she knew nothing about him, except that he was an obsessive note-taker and that he smelled like laundry detergent, she knew he would be her ideal man. Thus, she would be uncontrollably addicted to him. And though the first words out of her mouth would be, “Horrible weather we’re having today,” she just knew that they would have wonderfully deep and insightful conversations.

He looked up at her – she who was sitting across from him in another study booth – and she smiled sheepishly. She held up her psychology notebook, and he found that they were studying for the same exam.

In her mind, it was all planned out – they would begin studying together, he would finally invite her to dinner. She would play hard-to-get, but eventually agree to his request for her presence. They would eat tacos, become best friends, fall in love, get amazingly stable careers, and then get married all before she reached the age of 30, which to her, was an age that said, “You’re done with love forever.”

But that’s not exactly how things worked out, because she, never having dated, didn’t realize how far her addiction would go.

They did begin studying together, but it was she who finally asked him to dinner. He shrugged and took it casually, but she was more than elated. Though the conversation was awkward, a few more after-hours studying sessions later, things got better. He loosened up and seemed to open up to her more. And so she took charge.
“I’ll see you after your chemistry class today,” she said.
“But why? It’s on the opposite side of campus from you,” he said, putting his pen back into its pouch.
“Because I’m your girlfriend,” she answered matter-of-factly.
He stopped zipping up his backpack halfway and stared at her. She could feel her capillaries filling with unbearably hot blood, but remained resolute.
“Right,” he replied dryly, finishing his zipping.
That day, when he came out of his building to find that she had been eagerly awaiting him with two hot chocolates, and she handed him one and slipped her then-free hand into his, she couldn’t have been happier.

But slowly, she found herself doing the strangest things.

One time, she purposely got lost far from campus, and unable to figure out where she was, she panicked, feeling both the curious and the suspicious stares of those around her on the street. Face lined with tears, she called him at 3 a.m. – twice, because he was a heavy sleeper – and a groggy voice greeted her choked up one.
“I don’t know where I am, and I’m really scared,” she cried. “Can you come get me?”
Pajama- and boots-clad, he came to get her and took her back to her room, where she refused to let him leave until she fell asleep, gripping his hand so fiercely, he had to stretch it a few times on the way back to his own room.
Another time, she celebrated her failed final paper by getting extremely intoxicated to the point where she started yelling in the faces of complete strangers and dancing on top of a table. He pulled her down, shaking her wrist and shouting in her face, “Have you lost your mind? Have you seriously lost your mind?” over and over again until the words stopped sounding harsh, and they started to sound like a sweet lullaby, soothing her and reassuring her that one person, least of all Professor Mitchell, cared about her in this world. As he held back her hair in the bathroom and she poured out her guts, coughed up a lung, and lost all feeling of her brain, she thought she had never felt happier.

When things were normal, things were normal. They called each other once a day, regardless of whether or not they had seen each other. They made sure they ate lunch together on Tuesdays and Thursdays. He remembered their anniversaries and even created a decent surprise for their six-month affair, taking her out to dinner and then coming back to her room to find that he had invited her small circle of friends and some of his own for a night of Scrabble (her favorite game) and a viewing of the Godfather (his favorite movie.)

She distinctly remembered the first time they had exchanged “I love you” – she remembered what he was wearing, what the environment smelled like, what was going through her mind before they said it. And it was beautiful. So beautiful that she cried afterwards. And cried again when she thought about it when she got home. And got misty-eyed when she thought about it a week after.

She could never tire of hearing him say it. Three words had never mattered to her so much until she heard his husky voice repeat them to her over and over again on command.
“Can you say it one more time before I leave?”
He combed his hair with his fingers tentatively. “I love you, Allison.”
“I love you too, Derek.”
“I’ll see you tomorrow. Or I’ll text you later.”
“I’ll text you when I’m about to sleep.” She put on her shoes again and paused at the door. “I love you.”
He nodded. “Me too.”

He was so good to her – he listened to all her demands, all her problems, all her hopes and fears and dreams. She knew that she was being needy and inconsiderate of his own wants and needs, but she couldn’t help it. He loved her, and though that was an incredible fact to know, she needed it to be affirmed constantly, like an addiction that needed to constantly be fed.

One day, she thought she had lost her mind. So did he.

She had seen him interact with a girl from his church at the library. They were working together on a group project – the other member had failed to show up – and she observed them from afar while she caught up on some reading from her anthropology class. The girl laughed and touched his arm while she looked straight into his eyes. He smiled back amiably in a way that she hadn’t seen in a long time, and they returned to working on the poster in front of them. She felt like someone had punched her in the stomach – the sensation crawled from the tip of her head down to the bottom of her spine, and she suddenly felt like she couldn’t breathe. She saw them working diligently side-by-side, and all she could think was, “Help.”
He met her for dinner on campus, but she suggested they take a walk afterwards into the city. She held his hand tightly, her lips closed just as tightly.
“How was your afternoon?” he asked, wind blowing his moppy hair every which way.
“Fine,” she answered, half-closing her eyes as they strolled down the street. She could hear her heartbeat in her ears. It was deafening.
They reached the bridge that led into the city, and not knowing what came over her, she suddenly released his hand and started climbing up onto the railing of the bridge. She saw his face turn ghostly white and he grabbed for her waist, missed, and found her arm instead. She wobbled, making both their hearts stop for a second, and she balanced herself against a pole.
“What do you think you’re doing right now?!” he shouted, voice constricted.
She was eerily calm – her own calmness surprised her. “What do you think would happen if I lost my balance and just – ” she paused “- tipped over the bridge?”
Cars zoomed past them, and he kept feeling afraid that the wind force from the cars speeding past would knock her over.
“Wouldn’t it be funny? Like those America’s Funniest Home Videos you like to watch. Do you think I would make a big splash?”
“Allison, why are you doing this?” He tried to make his voice sound more delicate, more rational. “Come down right now. Let’s talk this out.”
She laughed. “What’s there to talk out? I’m just trying to live life more on the edge. Actually live life a bit.” She shook the arm he was holding onto. “Let go.”
“You’re acting like you want to die,” he said carefully. “I’m not letting go until you get down from there.”
“Why not? Why is death such a bad thing? Aren’t you always talking about how death isn’t the end – it’s the beginning?” Her voice shook. “Or maybe, since I’m going to hell, it’s the end, huh?”
“Allison, why are you doing this?” he repeated. “Don’t talk nonsense.”
“It’s not nonsense, it’s the truth. Just like the truth is, I love you. But you don’t love me,” she said. “And neither does your God. So I guess both living and dying are lose-lose situations for me.”
“I do love you, Allison,” he said. “I love you so much. How many times do I have to say it until you’ll believe me?”
“I know you’re tired of me.” She remembered the library church girl. “You can’t smile the way you used to. So how can I believe that that’s how you truly feel and that it’s not something you say out of habit?”
He loosened his grip on her arm, making her slip her arm out of his grasp; she fully embraced the pole now. “You’re right,” he said. “I am tired – of always having to prove myself to you. Love is based on trust, and you don’t trust me. So I guess you don’t really love me either.”
She stayed silent.

Neither of them knew how long they had stayed on the bridge like that, but eventually, he just grabbed her waist and pulled her down. They walked home without saying another word to each other.

The right words didn’t come for three days. But she finally mustered up the courage to apologize. He finally mustered up the courage to break it off.

She didn’t know how to cope except to bury herself in her studies, waiting for the next ray of sunshine to poke through the library windows. But when the brief warmth came, she shivered more, to her dismay.

© 2009. Sarah R.