#1

When I told him that I loved him his blue eyes began to drown themselves in a regretful sorrow. I saw a tear trickle down his cheek and he uttered out the words that have been imprinted into my brain since "I do not love you". I sat there, as this boy who I wanted to spend the rest of my life with told me he did not love me. I did not get mad at him. I did not tell him reasons that he needed love me. I did not plead with him to love me. I simply smiled at him and with a shaking voice told him "That is okay, most people do not." and walked away. I could not stomach myself enough to swallow the monster that was my own pride. Was it because I was not pretty enough for him to want to see my face every morning when he woke up? Was it because I was not thin enough for him to hold in one arm while lazily pointing with other? Was it because I was not brave enough to tell him that he needed me? It was none of these things; perhaps it was that he was never enough for me.

#2
He cheated on me. He never told me though. He never told me that he slept with six other girls within the first three months of us dating. He never told me that he preferred their thin figures over my plump one. He never told me why, but he did not have to.
He cheated on me because it did not matter how much he loved me, he could not control the demons that led him. He cheated on me because he thought I was cheating on him. He cheated on me because he knew that his father cheated on his mother every other Wednesday when he was a child with the woman down the street who smelt of lavender. He cheated on me with other girls that reminded him nothing of me because to him I was a shattered image in his mind that he could not touch without wincing from the pain. He cheated on me because he knew that no matter how many times he cheated on me I would still care. He cheated on me because of much like myself, he knew that he was never going to be the right man for me no matter how hard he tried.

#3
My mother never warned me about guys like you. She warned me about the guys who would want to knock the bible out of my arms and put a baby in place of the bible. She warned me about the guys who would make me give up my goals to help them pursue theirs. Yet, she never once told about the guy who wanted to put the bible in my hands and open it. She did not tell me about the boy who would email me when I missed my 9:30 AM class to make sure that I was okay. She did not tell me that this boy was far too soft to love someone who was harder than cement. She did not tell that I would be the reason he would cry himself to sleep most nights. However, she did tell me that he was a nice boy who needed to know the truth. She told me that sometimes we get our hearts broken, other times we break other people's hearts. Yet, after telling me these two important things she never told me which one hurts the most.

#4

I never saw him coming. Which is actually kind of funny. Especially when you consider the fact that he was covered with yellow caution tape because he was a crime scene. Yet, being naive I thought it was a great idea to trespass through the caution tape and try to solve the mystery. I tried to fix the broken image that he was, yet every time I believed that I had him figured out, another clue would come along that would throw off my investigation. I could not solve the mystery that he was without tearing myself apart, so I resigned without notice. I quit answering his text messages and phone calls. Yet, sometimes when I cannot sleep at night a piece of information will cross my mind that makes me think that I can solve the cold case this boy has become.

#5

After #4 I spent a long time hitting my knees praying for #3 to come back. I never received #3 again but I got #5. #5 is perfect he has the mystery of #4 without any of the toxicity, but the gentleness of #3 to keep me grounded. Maybe that is why he has always had the chance to become the final number for me. His porcelain and blue eyes are still my second home. I prayed. I prayed to meet him. I prayed for him to love me. I prayed for our future. Yet, while I was busy praying for all of these things I never once prayed for myself. I did not pray that I would be able to soothe his dark thoughts that no one else knew about. I never prayed that I would able to carry the demons that both of us carried. I never prayed to be able to love him. I never prayed that I would be able to protect his heart that he handed to me so delicately. When he handed me his heart I firmly grasped it in my hands expecting it to shatter as gently. I clasped that heart one night expecting to crush it, yet I never had the courage to grip hard enough. While this heart belonged to me, I knew that I also belonged to it.

So now when I pray, I pray he can forgive me for constantly running in and then running out because I am scared. I wonder if he knows that it has always been him even when I swore it was not.

#6

I gave him four years of life, hoping that one day that we both may realize how we have our greatest blessings in front of our faces. The constant back and forth relationship left me emotionally drained and physically distressed. Yet, no matter how hard I tried to love him, I could not. Everyone thought this boy with kind brown eyes was "the one", yet to me, it felt as though he was just another one.

We tried. We tried to love each other, but between the broken glasses and black eyes, love was never found. Instead, we found Love's cousins Jealousy and Regret. "Why are you texting them?!" Was shouted until my eyes were filled with tears.I quickly began to understand why Love's cousin Regret came to visit so often because this boy who once had eyes filled with miniature fires, now had eyes filled with cities burning inside of them. I regretted ever agreeing to light the spark between us. I regretted letting him come back to the house he had burnt down so many times. I regretted letting him know my favorite color on Mondays was yellow.
I regretted him.

#7

He had once told me that there was a girl before me. He talked about her once, but I did not ask more about her because it seemed to pain him, and since I cared so much I did not want to see him hurt. Often times he would make casual references to her in conversations when he was upset with me. He would compare me to her and I would always fall short. It did not matter how hard he wanted to move on from her, he could not. Like a car without its timing belt, his heart and mind were stuck in the same place. I pushed him. I pushed him away from me and back into her arms.

He now calls her arms home again.

#8

When I had black eyes and bruised cheeks I translated that into meaning that he cared more than I did.When he bruised three of my ribs and broke one, I thought that meant he loved me. When I had the taste of blood in my mouth and bruises on my thighs I wanted to marry him. When he pinched my fat under the restaurant table and told me that I was "too much", I realized that he was never enough.

#9

My eyes filled with tears the first time that we had met; tears of laughter. His jokes were almost as bad as mine and I loved it. When we went on our first date my eyes had to wait until he dropped me off to fill themselves with tears again. That is because he has told me that the day before we met he had planned to kill himself that night. The last time I saw him both of our eyes were filled with tears because with a shaking voice he told me that he did not have the nerve to live anymore.

#10

His bones popped effortlessly under his skin, but sometimes they would pop so loud that I believed the flesh covering them was ripping apart at the seams, much like I was. He met me at a rough time in my life. Maybe it was the tear stained pillow case or the fist balled in anger but he tried to soothe whatever demons I carried. Yet, the only demon that I continued to carry was knowing that I was using him. I tried to tell him that I was not the girl for him, and he did not listen to me. He tried to love me so hard that he quit loving himself. He was ripping his skin apart every night and was now dealing with his own demon: me.