It has always felt unnatural for me to say, leaving me questioning if this feeling is genuinely something intrinsic, or an emotion only a select few have the key to unlock. Letting the phrase escape my mouth felt unnerving and paranormal–It left me still, calloused in a resilient plaster of embarrassment. No matter who was saying “I love you,”, a relentless, incessant bridge seemed to build itself between us each time those words were said, causing an awkward pause and an unsure “love you,” back.
Maybe it was the split household, leaving half my heart in one state and the other here. Maybe it was misinterpreted unrequited love in the fourth grade. Or possibly the stab of piteous discomfort from the dagger of shame when those who liked me realized I did not feel the same way. To be frank, I am still not sure. And after 18 years of being single, the distance between the question and it’s answer only seems to grow.
I loved vicariously through friends’ rants and social media posts. I said “I love you” through comment sections and double taps. I experienced my first breakup through aiding my best friend through hers. I was crowned “best advice giver” for counseling people through frivolous relationship problems begging to be mended with simple communication. I watched and believed that love was finite, bound to end by even the slightest disturbance. It was binary and ranged anywhere from ‘like’ to complete adoration and devotion.
For years I questioned if love was even in my reach. I scanned the hallways for an attractive face just to have some infatuation to gossip about at lunch, hoping to cognize this obscurity everyone already understood. I searched for something tangible: a puzzle piece, a code, or even a pencil to solve this incomprehensible equation.
But I found nothing but myself crashing into a dam, causing an overwhelming waterfall of apperception, freeing me from the plaster. My hands cracked initially, allowing my fingers to pick off the remnants on my heart. Then followed my legs, releasing them from numbness and lastly, my head, leaving pieces of me scattered and vulnerable. I opened my eyes and saw that love is not calculable. Nor is it finite, or a puzzle to decipher, or even a lock I needed to find the key for.
Love is in the irises as brown as sweet whiskey of an overactive furry friend. It’s the crinkle next to her twinkling eyes accompanying a reassuring smile. It’s the melodic laughter sung from young mouths that harmonize faultlessly, enveloping the space in joy. Love is dog-earing book pages tattooed in pen ink and graphite, because they remind him of a friend. It’s not something that has to inevitably end in distress.
