It couldn’t end any other way, could it? When you feel something so powerful, when all your love and passion end up in the wrong hands, it crushes you so badly, it almost kills you.
Everything started so fast. From the day I met you, I felt like there was some instant connection. It was almost like I knew you would be someone important to me, like I had been waiting for that moment for all of my life.
When we talked for the first time, I was playing it cool. I don’t know If I pulled it off or not because my cheeks were blushing, my heart was pounding and I was afraid you would hear it. I felt like a teenage girl who had just met her crush. I wasn’t one to fall in love so easily but I guess I fell for you right there and then.
You fell for me too. At least that’s what you said. After a while, we started to date. We entered into a relationship so fast, and it was unlike me, as I am an overthinker so I like to think long and hard before deciding on something important. But it felt so natural to be with you that I just put my guard down.
Everything seemed so incredible. We could talk for hours about anything and everything. We had similar tastes in music, movies, and food so it was easy to hang out with you. We would make an ordinary day extraordinary in a matter of seconds. Plus we had this incredible chemistry; sparks would fly all over every time we locked eyes. We were undressing each other with our eyes every time we were in the same room. Beds were breaking when we were alone. Everything seemed perfect.
Everything was perfect, until one day it wasn’t anymore. You changed, or you showed your real face because you were tired of acting—acting like you were this normal, caring and loving person I had waited to meet my whole life. You became someone I couldn’t recognize.
All of a sudden, everything I said or did bothered you. I was always the one to blame no matter what happened and no matter whether it had anything to do with me at all or not. Somebody would piss you off and you would take it out on me. Every time we would get into a fight, it was always my fault. I didn’t understand you, I didn’t support you, basically everything I did, I did wrong, I could no longer see in you that reasonable and gentle person I had spent so much time with.
Everything revolved around you. Things you needed and things you wanted. It was like I didn’t exist anymore. Like I didn’t matter to you at all. On the other hand, I would go out of my way to please you. I wanted us to work. I wanted you to be happy. I couldn’t let all those special and meaningful moments go to waste like they had never happened just because you were going through a rough patch.
But your rough patch had no end. Sure, you had your days when you would be your old self, the you that I used to know, the you who I fell in love with but those days were so rare. So rare that I felt like I had only known pain since I had known you. Your behavior had gotten worse and our fights became our only means of communication.
You became distant and I could never figure out what was happening in that mind of yours. Every time I would ask you to share your feelings and thoughts with me, you would say there was nothing to share. Every time I asked you to work on us, to work on our relationship, you seemed uninterested or you would say you would try but you never did, not really. You trying to be better, to treat me better, would last for a few days and then you would go back to showing your true self.
I wasn’t about to give up on us. I tried, I really did. But there was that one moment that woke me up and made me see clearly for the first time. The moment, during one of our fights, where you raised your hand to hit me, and before I realized what was happening, you slapped me so hard that all the love I felt for you turned into fear.
You were sorry once you had cooled off, when you realized what you had done. But it was too late for stories. All the apologies in this world couldn’t make that better. You begged me for forgiveness but I was already out of the door, going somewhere, anywhere, away from you.
I couldn’t believe that you had that in you. Despite all the problems we had, I never thought you could ever do something like that, that you could ever be so violent. It took me a long long time to recover from you. But I managed. I got to the point where I was grateful for that slap in the face as it really made me see the real you—somebody toxic and violent, some stranger in the body of a man I once loved.
I am grateful because if it wasn’t for that slap, I would have stayed with you longer, I would have put up with everything, thinking things would change. I was living in hell and I would have kept on doing so if it hadn’t been for that horrible night. I loved you so truly, madly, deeply and all I have to show for that love is a nasty scar on my heart that carries a bitter memory of you.