This is not a love story straight out of the books like some cheap Scottish romance novel. You know about 3 reasons why it’s not; they’re all terrible and selfish and hurtful, but you keep them locked under your tongue, swallow them down and go headfirst into the next day.
Reason 1: It’s a compromise, nothing more
You never kiss. Kissing is for people who haven’t faith hanging around their neck like a thick old fisher-rope. Kissing is for boyfriends and girlfriends, for husbands and wives, for people trying to save the world and not the ones determined to burn it down. Kissing is not for the people with hollow holes inside their chests and vodka-blurred eyes. Kissing is not for you. You’re sitting cross-legged on some cheap king size bed with dirty sheets, in a motel outside of your little hometown. He sits at the end of the bed, legs on the floor, elbows on the knees and naked torso bent over while he counts and flips money bills with quick flicks of his wrists. You see a clunky flash of silver studding in his tongue as he licks his lips. The roof of your mouth still tastes like the cheap vodka that came in electric blue plastic bottles. You lean forward until your chin rests on top of his edged shoulder. What do you want? he says at some point, warm breath gracing your cheeks. Maybe we should get Thai, you suggest. He turns around, swift motions and hard grips, and suddenly you lie under him. Your spine hits the mattress hard. Maybe I can give you something else? He pushes your legs apart until you can see his neatly manicured line of dark, wiry hair trailing beneath his navel. You want to lick it. Maybe, you say and lick your lips with deliberate strokes. He attacks your neck. Kissing is not for you.
Reason 2: You’re too much co-dependent
You’re sitting on the roof of his house, sipping some kind of drink someone mixed you. It’s a sky blue color with dark navy sugar crystals around the rim of the cup - it looks delicious but tastes like straight out of hell. Burned whiskey and coconut fruit. You feel tired. You’re gone for half an hour when you hear the flat pace of another human being on the roof. He flops down next to you.
Don’t wanna talk, you say and drink another gulp of the strange substance. It pours down your throat like a thick, succulent juice. You suppress a cough that catches behind your row of perfect teeth. Too tired for words. You don’t need to say anything. You already feel too much. He doesn’t say anything either. He laughs out once, loud and cackling, but the sound is a hollow cry like a wounded animal. You watch his pulse beat beneath the thin layer of pale, bluish skin. When he reaches over to push your head down on his collarbone you do nothing to stop him. The faint trace of weed and sweat is familiar to your nose by now so you bury deeper between the pointed bones of his chest until you feel the familiar pain of burning tears behind your eyes. His fingers dig hard against your skull. You don’t mind.
Reason 3: There will be no Happy Ending
You watch him and another boy. For anyone else it looks like an argument or some kind of misconception that only spilled blood can settle. But you know it’s not what it looks like. It’s not like that. Careful spit insults and bloody knuckles make room for something else. For more. A sleek sliver of a taboo you were not sure existed for either of you two. Something inside of you, right between the fragile bones of your ribcage, rips furiously. You push yourself off the ground and fade between dark shades. When you’re far enough to ignore him, you start to run. This is not a love story. It never was.
- 3 reasons not to love him | r.m - upcoming in Tales