She saw him sitting on a worn wooden bench in the evening sunlight of a cool autumn day. He wore a purple grey shirt with a vague and intricate art design that nicely hugged the taught muscles beneath. Long dark curls that went well with his olive toned skin fell into his eyes; those swirling pools of emerald moss that drew her in with seemingly eternal depth stared straight into the horizon. It was instantaneous; she was pulled towards him in a way she had never felt towards anyone before. If he was north, she was a compass, always searching for him, always trying to go to him.
He had been spacing out, thinking about the nothing he felt inside. He stared at the sun in hopes that it would suddenly burst, frying him and every other living thing on this planet to cinders. He felt lukewarm, internally empty, but a living person outwardly. If he felt nothing, he wanted to become nothing as well. Hearing the scraping of dead leaves against the cool concrete, he turned and saw a thin frail girl standing with her back hunched over from the weight of her back pack. She had long auburn hair with a few pieces sticking out like fried wires. Her cream colored cheeks were heavily sprinkled with pale freckles. He stared for perhaps a bit too long before returning to his original slouched position against the old uncomfortable bench listening to his grunge music.
She followed his gaze that met her own and calmly walked towards him and sat down, emanating excited tension. Her body language was inviting. She wanted to converse with this handsome stranger. She let out a squeak as means of communication and in return he gave her a dirty sidelong glance. She blushed, giving her freckles a rosy setting, and tried again. “Hi.” Sensing this girl would not leave him alone he indulged her pathetic attempt at table talk and responded with a cold, “Hello.” Joy blossomed in her chest, excitement invigorating every particle of her being upon garnering a response. His oaky voice filled her ears and her heart. She was past the point of no return. Interpreting his response as acceptance, all of her tension evaporated, leaving only frazzled nerves which allowed her immense enthusiasm to flood out. She felt like she had had five shots of espresso in her morning coffee that was only just kicking in. Excitedly she started off with a very simple surface level question of, “How are you?” to which he responded, “Not good.”
He hoped his terse response would scare off the little nymph like thing and be the end of this conversation. He had wanted to be left alone, and this unwarranted interruption was starting to piss him off. She kept talking. Striking up new topics of conversation, she never seemed at a lack for words. Her voice echoed within his head like a cave, he felt like he was going to burst. In a fit of rage and frustration he slapped her across the face to shut her up. The action was followed by complete silence, as if time had stopped to gape in shock at the event that had just occurred. The only way to describe her was the word stunned. Realizing his error, his heart sank into his stomach. He rushed to apologize but this girl never did stop talking. Interrupting his repenting litany she asked, “Do you want to go out with me?”
She loved him much more than she liked him. Her feelings were more synonymous to that of an unhealthy obsession. She just couldn’t bring herself to not think about him every second. Even in her dreams she saw her wonderfully dark boyfriend with a small smirk on his lips and smarting hand that matched the red mark on her face. She wouldn’t know what to do with herself, with her life, were he to disappear. Although she didn’t care much for his personality or his verbally and physically abusive actions, she told herself that those flaws could be overlooked in order to be close to him. She hung on every word, every single movement of his, she mirrored in her own repositioning, and trailed behind him every chance she got, not wanting to miss a moment of his life. She wanted to touch him, and be touched in return, she wanted to be held and caressed lovingly, yet, this lack of physical expression made her love for him stronger.
He hated her. He hated the way she would try to cling to his arm when they went out and the way she loved him effortlessly. He thought she was a sad excuse for a living being. How could she love him, who had immediately been so cruel? Her ability to love him despite his shortcomings confused him, made him angry. He, who was once a black hole, was now filled with the murky swirling red dust clouds of anger. If only he had looked close enough to see at the center of the storm, there was a small inner cyclone of peace and genuine happiness that hadn’t lived within him in years.
She wanted to escape the hurricane of feelings this relationship entailed. Every time she tried to just hold on to his arm, she would be gruffly shrugged off. Often he used his words as weapons to attack her self esteem, self respect, dignity. It drove her mad. Despite all of the pain she suffered, she loved him all the more. She couldn’t quit him. If anything, the danger drew her in, making her do the exact things that would warrant rough handling. Every so often, she would have moments of clarity during which she would realize the reality of her situation. She would break down in tears, not girlish crying, but heart wrenching sobs that caused her entire body to lurch into her bed and soak her pillow with silent tears. What could she do? She was trapped.
He couldn’t take it anymore. He was suffocating. He, who had for so long been running on empty, ready to die out, was now full of thick, heavy feelings. He was conflicted. He admired her infallible love for him; he hated her for this reason as well. He was honored by these feelings and they made him feel anger towards himself for his poor treatment of her. She was nothing but kind and he continued to treat her badly, with even seemingly increasing cruelty and terribleness. He fought with the ideas that raged within him of trying to reciprocate and instead acting in a senseless, animalistic way. The rusted pipes of his heart, his soul, were flooded with strong fresh feelings and they were closer to breaking than ever before.
It was an ordinary day, a bit colder than their initial meeting day, seeing that it was finally December. It was the Friday that initiated the long winter vacation. She had graciously invited him over to exchange gifts and to spend time together before she went away for Christmas. They sat in her bedroom upstairs while her parents scurried around in preparation of the family trip downstairs. Again she was filled with nervousness similar to that she had felt at their very first meeting. To be fair, those nerves never really went away. Every time she was in his presences they somehow crept up within her, crawling beneath her skin, making her jittery, and chatty. She blabbed on about the present she had gotten him, how much care she took in picking it out, the time she had spent searching for it, and the joy she had felt when she had finally found it. She had wrapped it humming to herself commercial Christmas tunes from the radio and was so proud when she handed him the little box covered in gold paper.
He finally understood the nervousness she obviously felt constantly. His hands were embarrassingly clammy but he was easily distracted by her incessant talking that was starting to build up that primal rage within him. She stopped talking as she thrust forward the tacky gold box that was poorly wrapped with tape in awkward places. At first he thought her gift was her silence but he quickly realized and took the box. He carelessly unwrapped it and proceeded to remove the lid to find a violet and steel colored knit beanie. He picked it up, feeling the high quality of the material, soft against his calloused fingers. He finally broke. He started to cry, tears of joy and happiness and unspeakable feelings of reciprocated love for her. He wiped his hands on his jeans in order to dry them off and reached out towards her, taking her into his arms, holding her in a firm tight embrace.
The warmth from his body against hers ignited internal fireworks. She was ecstatic with this new development in their relationship that she began to cry with him. Tears fell from both of their eyes, mixing together in a salty mess that was absorbed into their clothes. He never let go of her, but readjusted the position of his arms. He no longer encircled her neck with the warmth of a hug, but his strong hands wrapped themselves around her throat, choking her. He gripped with a passionate determination he had never applied to anything before, squeezing tighter and tighter until he lost all feeling in his hands. She never stopped loving him. While his grip encircled her thin throat she continued to cry tears of ecstasy, thankful for this expression and reciprocation of the feelings of love she held for him. He felt her body go limp beneath his grip, but he never let go, never releasing his hold. Finally, after a good amount of time had passed, he let go. Tears streamed down his face and hers, except his kept flowing while hers began to dry.