Unrequited Love

As long as he could remember, he'd always laughed at those who said that. Since he learnt their meaning anyway. Unrequited Love.




And Not just at "Unrequited love" but at 'love' too. He could still remember saying that love wasn't real, that it didn't exist. That it was just a play on the mind by chemicals, by hormones. It wasn't real, it couldn't be. Love was just a name given to the natural mating instincts which have been in existence since the beginning of existence itself. Attraction. Not love. People were not created in twos, they didn't need to be together, they didn't have to be together.



But now, he had begun to question his theories, his beliefs. Why? Because of her. The first girl he loved. The first girl who rejected him.



And so, he sat there, legs dangling from the edge of the cliff, thinking. He didn't notice the waves crashing on to the rocks below him. He was drowning, in his thoughts, in his premature dreams, in the conclusions he had jumped to.



Ever since the beginning of the time when boys began to notice girls and girls, boys. They noticed him. All of them, and his charm never wore off. Papi-lindo they called him, and he knew what every girl wanted, what they needed to hear. Everything a girl could want, he was handsome, had a good voice, was smart and he could make the ladies swoon, no matter how old or young they were. Mr. Perfect, they called him. Those who had been deceived.



Sitting there, he remembered the many women in his life. He could barely remember their names anymore. Like the waves crashing harmlessly on the side of the mighty mountains, barely touching, barely worth remembering. Maybe it was because he preferred not to remember, or he chose not to remember...



The girl, who had been in his class since grade school. He knew that she was crazy about him but it hadn't made a difference. Anything he needed done, he got her to do it for him. If he had to brag about a new girlfriend, it was to her. He knew it hurt her but it didn't make a difference to him, why should he care? Thinking about how she felt, not his job, but dating her best friend, sure why not? Still like a yoyo on a string she kept coming back to him. Pushed her away, then pulled her back, over and over again. When his friends asked him why he was doing it, said she loved him he laughed. Since, according to him it wasn’t possible to love.



He thought about that sweet little junior girl he went out with in his sophomore year. The first girl he had been with who had seen love the way he did. She never said she loved him, just that she really liked him. He threw the word 'love' at her and she held onto it, like it was a life preserver. He got over her in weeks but he led her on for months. Years later he met her friend and found that she never trusted another man after him. Because of him. Later, thinking about it he had laughed. Laughed so hard he cried.



So many more he didn't remember. And there would have been so many more. Except that there was one thing he hadn't counted on. Falling in love. With someone who didn't love him.



The first time he met her, he didn't imagine that she would be the one who'd turn his life around a hundred and eighty degrees. He thought she would be just another girl whose heart he could rip out and show off. Just another girl whose dreams he'd crush under his Papi-lindo feet. Except that, there was one thing he took for granted. Her falling in love with him.



He dreamt ahead. Why wouldn't anyone want to be with him? He couldn't think of any possible reason, and so, he dreamt. He dreamt of her, of how it could have been with her. Of how she was everything he wanted, of how she would say he was everything she needed. But then again, life didn't do the way he planned. What goes around comes around, you could say...



Now, sitting there, a couple of hundred feet above the waves crashing on the rocks, he realized, that was the one thing he shouldn't have taken for granted. Because that was the one thing that didn't go according to plan. Besides him falling in love with her, of course.



He watched the water. It was blue, very blue. And after crashing against the rocks, a foamy white. It would be so easy to just lose himself under the waves. To be one with the oceans. to go wherever the water went. To remember. To try to forget. To move on. To forget



He made his decision. The fact that he was very, very drunk helped a bit, if not a lot. He acted, before he could change his mind. He felt the images in his head grow fuzzy. He tried to concentrate on what he wanted to do. A part of him was screaming at him, to just get up, move on and walk away. But then he didn't have to try very hard to subdue that voice, though. He knew he wanted to, that he had to. He felt his fingers scraping desperately on the rocks on the edge of the cliff., trying to hold on. Then suddenly, as if it was then that his body understood what his mind desired to do, he let go. His hands stopped trying to hold on. His hands and arms relaxed.



He looked down at the water, the blue water he was going to crash into momentarily. Even though he saw the water becoming closer and closer to him, and felt his world coming to a close, he felt an odd calm. He felt something, something he placed as remorse. After 26 years of life, it was now, in his final moments that he believed in fate, in kismet. That what goes around, always came around.



He felt the cool water, falling, as droplets onto his face. He opened his eyes and found himself lying on his back, sweet rain droplets falling on his face. He laughed, a hollow laugh, at himself, at all the women who had ever been deceived. He got up, dusted himself off and walked away from the cliff. Feeling no remorse because love, was a fantasy. Love didn't exist.