Love Is A Choice

Melissa

She sat from across the room and watched as his chocolate skin blended with the dark of the night to cast a silhouette of something huge on the bed.

“How could he just go to sleep like that?! How could he go to bed like we did not just have one of the biggest fights of our lives? The very existence of our relationship is on the line and he’s sleeping?! What am I to do with this boy? Is this all there is to us? Was I just a toy to entertain him till he got tired and wanted to move on? Did I imagine all the nights and moments that we had shared? Is this truly the man I am looking at right now? I can’t believe this.”

She tried talking but it only made things worse. “I guess communication isn’t always key like they say. No one gets me. They never have and they never will. I was born to die alone. I shouldn’t have tried.”

Melissa continued to think about all the negative things her mind could muster. Relationships had always been a rollercoaster of love and pain for her. It was that way with everyone but hers always seemed to have an extra sprinkle of drama. She looked at the bed the both of them had been sharing for the past five nights in their one-week vacation. Nothing ever seemed to turn out right with them.

She wanted to move towards the bed but an unseen force held her rooted to the reading chair she had been watching him from. The large room suddenly became tiny and she felt an uncontrollable desire to leave the room. Checking the time on her phone, she knew she could not leave the room without causing a commotion in the entire house. It was the least thing she wanted, so she quickly scratched it off her mind.

“What do I do? Right now, I can’t bear to lie down on the same bed with Ronny that I made sweet love to. The same bed where he showed me what it meant to not love but be loved by someone. All these years, I have only loved. I have loved and loved, I have given and continued to give. I never got to receive and now I finally know what it means to be loved. I finally met the one but he’s broken. Just like me…“

She looked around the now small cubicle of a room and decided to settle on the floor as the reading chair was already leaving a painful mark on her back. She scooted to the farthest space from the bed that she could find, and settled down to think things through. There would be no sleep for her that night. Not until she had a talk with Ronny concerning the matter at hand.

“Ronny… R-Ronny. I don’t know why you would be sleeping peacefully at a time like this but you need to get up right now. We need to talk. I can’t do this anymore. I’m tired.”

No response.

“Ronny did you hear what I said?! I said I’m tired of all these back and forth arguments. I quit! I can’t take this anymore. I’m too insecure to keep on loving you. I don’t know if I can hold on to you anymore… I have tried my best. I give up …”

A cough. Followed immediately by a sneeze.

“I really need to get him that cough syrup in the morning. It has lasted too long. Wait… what am I even thinking?! Did I not just tell him that I was done? Shit! I really can’t let go of this guy now, can I?… Why do I have to love him so much?”

A teardrop.

Ronny

Ronny had heard everything Melissa had been saying and even the ones she was too scared to say out loud. He had followed her from the reading chair to the ground in his mind. He had paused with her to look at their beloved temple where he had vowed to make love to her every single day of his life. He had heard the soft whimper of her teardrop too. He hated himself at that moment.

He knew he should say something– reassure her, “make her feel safe“, but he did not know what to say. He had never been good with words.

He didn’t know what to say or do, but he knew he had to do something or he really would wind up losing the love of his life.

“No matter what, I have to figure out a way out of this. I can’t afford to lose Isa. She’s the best thing that has happened to me in forever. A rare gem that only surfaces once in a thousand years. I’ll probably never find someone like her. I need to fix this… fix us. Shit! I hate it when we fight like this, but I gotta try. Oh well, here goes nothing.”

He turned over and rested his eyes where he knew she would be sitting with her earphones plugged in. She had a painfully annoying habit of sitting on the floor and listening to music whenever they had a misunderstanding. When asked why she would say she couldn’t bear to lie down on the same bed with him when they were quarreling.

Nothing vexed him more than that stupid habit of hers, but he couldn’t stop loving her either way. If anything, it made him want to reach over to her and drag her off from the floor so he could suffocate her in his loving embrace. He would teach her a lesson alright, but that would have to wait till they had sorted things out. Right now, his primary objective was getting her to talk things out with him.

“If she would agree that is…”

“Isa… come let’s talk things out. I’m sorry I got you angry but you know I don’t like you sitting on the floor. Please come here, let’s talk about this, my baby…”

“I don’t wanna! You don’t love me, Ronny. If you did you wouldn’t have gone to bed like we did not just have the biggest fight of our life. How could you have slept soundly knowing I was not beside you? Do you even care about me at all? You didn’t even try to reassure me. You didn’t make any attempt to make me feel safe, and now that I have woken you up, you suddenly want to talk?! You want me to sit beside you?! Nah, man. You fucked up big time.”

She knew how to get to him alright. She knew the right words, tone, pitch, hell even body language to use to get him to cower in frustration. How she could make him feel like strangling her and at the same time kissing her, he didn’t understand.

His lips separated but no sound came out. None could. Not after getting reprimanded like that. It had been a while since he got that kind of scolding from anybody. He felt like a preschooler all over again and even though his subconscious mind wanted to switch into the defense immediately, he paused. After ruminating on the entire incident from start to finish, he knew what to do.

“Isa…”

No response.

“Baby…”

Still no response.

“My love, you can’t do me like this. I’m really sorry I left you on the floor like that. I know I should have said something– anything– to make you feel safe and reassured with me after seeing Ruthie’s texts but I…”

“What the? Ruthie? What the fuck is Ruthie?! Are you calling her nicknames in front of me?! When we are trying to sort out a misunderstanding?! Have you no respect for me Ronny?!?”

“Melissa please calm the fuck down! Please calm down and let me explain things to you. Those text messages are not what they seem honey. Please believe me. I told her…”

“Told her that what, Ronny?! Those texts aren’t what they seem?!? She bloody told you she misses you, she misses the times you guys shared, she misses the way you tickle behind her left ear and whisper ‘I love you’ whenever she’s sad or moody. She told you she still loves you, YOU Ronny.

She fucking told you all that and what did you do? What did you do my man? You said ‘me too’. They were the only words you said but they were more than enough. Why?! Why would you say something like that? Why would you do something like that to me?!? You don’t love me Ronny… you don’t.”

Melissa was breathing hard. Her boobs bounced behind her sleek satin nightdress, attempting to bounce out of the low cleavage but they dared not misbehave at such a critical time. Normally, Ronny would have been distracted by them and made his way to greet them, but that could be done later. Right now, he had to sort things out with their owner. He let out an awkward cough before making his second attempt.

“Mmmm… Melissa, it honestly isn’t what you think. I know that a lot of things that shouldn’t be said were said and that I did nothing to stop it while it was happening but I promise you that after I typed ‘me too’ I told her that I was happier and healthier with you and I’d choose moving forward with you over our toxic history anytime, any day. And I wasn’t lying about it. I’d choose you and the peace of mind you always bring. I love you, Melissa. I really do.”

She started with a brow raise. After which, she stood up to sit beside him on the bed. Hope and relief mixed in her tear-filled eyes. She proceeded to hold on to his left arm with both her palms.

“You really mean that? Show me. I wanna see her response.”

Melissa

“Oh my gosh. He actually told her off. He told her he wanted to be with me, that he loved me, and wanted to move forward with me. He chose us over them. He wasn’t lying. Still, why did he have to say ‘me too’? Argh! Why does this boy have to leave me feeling confused and insecure sometimes?!? He knows how insecure I get whenever Ruthie is involved so why does he still talk with her? I get that loves me and will choose me over her, but that doesn’t mean I’ll rest assured about their friendship. No guy should still be close friends or emotionally attached to his ex.”

“Old flames die hard.”

“Uhn? What did you say, Isa? Didn’t get that.” He was looking hard at her. It felt like he had garnered all the concentration in the world to look at her and she couldn’t help but cower under its weight.

“I-I said old flames d-die hard, Ronny.”

She was looking flushed and it took Ronny a minute to get what she was driving at. When understanding dawned on him, his once wide eyes slowly went dim until they were closed. She watched him closely, from the heaves to the way his lashes batted slightly, to the awkward cough and uneasy body movements. She knew she had touched a sensitive spot, and that wanted she wanted.

“Old flames die hard uhn?… Well, I’d understand you feeling uneasy with me knowing there’s a 0.000001 percent chance that I might get back with Ruthie, but the same way I chose you is the same way you are going to have to choose me. I don’t know what else I need to say to make you feel safe, wanted, enough, with me, and honestly, I don’t think there’s much I can do about it at this point.”

At this moment, Melissa was shivering lightly. Her body was warm all over and she could feel a familiar wetness in between her thighs. She inwardly cursed herself for getting horny again while they were arguing. She made a mental note to check out the correlation between her getting horny and her arguing with her partner. It wasn’t the first time. Something had to be done about it.

Ronny stood up and stretched out his arms towards her so she could take them in hers to stand upright. She conceded and in a second, she knew she was where she was meant to be. Crying softly in his arms she knew that no matter how tough their road was going to get, she was going to keep choosing him.

“I love you, Ronny. I fell in love with you from the moment you sat down to listen to me weep about how sorry my life was at that moment. You didn’t care that it was our first time meeting in person, you awkwardly and patiently stuck with me through that dinner date and listened. I have loved you from that moment to this that I am crying again. And you know what? I choose to keep on loving you. I choose you, Ronny.”

Ronny pulled her away from his embrace and stared softly into her eyes. The light from the full moon outside rested on his innocent boyish face. He looked like an adventurer that had just discovered a chest of treasures and he smiled wildly in his mind.

“I hit a jackpot with this one. She sure is one very fine specimen of a woman. Thank you, God, for blessing me with this woman called Melissa. I’m surely going to work hard enough to prove myself worthy of this gift.”

“You know baby, to some love is a feeling. Some people describe it as an emotion. For me, love is a conscious act of choosing someone no matter what baggage the person brings as long as they are willing to work on it. I dare say, my love, that love is a choice. It is a continuous, consistent, and diligent effort to keep choosing the other person no matter the highs or lows, and baby, I choose you. I love you, Isa.”

Fighting back the raging tears that threatened to pour out from the corners of her eyes, she rushed into his arms once again and wailed her heartfelt response back to the man she had already vowed inwardly to keep on loving for the rest of her waking moments.

“I love you too Ronald. I love you with every single breath that my lungs can offer me, and I choose you too my Breath. I want to do life with you, and I always continue to choose us no matter how scared and insecure or worthless I feel.”

“I love you!”

All images are sourced from unsplash.com