Holding Back
By ZealPropht
Just one more word and I'm going to break.
You knew that, didn't you, when you came up to me? You said all the things
I didn't want to hear.
You know how I feel. Why do you hurt me?
I'm sick of trying to hide from the blows. Velvet covered hammers drop on
my brain every time you say those three dreaded words.
I love you.
You ask how come I can't love you back. You make me sick. Stop looking at
me with those eyes that are filled with tears, liquid accusation dripping
down your cheeks. Stop making me want to pull you close to me and wipe my
fingers through the salty trails and tell you everything is going to be all
right.
Even I have my pride.
I swear I'm going to hit you if you keep staring at me with those wounded,
puppy-dog eyes. Dark and warm, pleading with me for answers I can't give.
I don't know them myself.
They say I should leave you. Did you know that? They say I am not good for
you. Analytical love is not real love. I'm supposed to be romantic and
passionate, all that good garbage they write about in soap operas to draw
the masses.
I don't like holding hands for very long. My palm gets hot pressed against
yours. I don't want to offend you with something as base as my sweat. I don't
like to kiss, not because you're especially bad at it, but because it's like
an invitation for you to come into my soul and I don't want to give you the
wrong ideas. Intimacy scares me. I bet you never guessed that, did
you?
My walls come down for no one.
I put up barriers for a purpose, you know. I don't like being hurt. I've
had enough bad experiences in the past to make me wary of love in general.
They say the only two things in life that can be trusted are yourself, and
family. I know this to be somewhat true. I've never had a family to fall
back on, so I only had myself. But when you look at me with those eyes of
yours, I feel as if I don't know the person I see reflected in their
depths.
Who are you, stranger? Why do you sit there with that unfeeling facade plastered
like a cheap mask all over your face? Stop it! STOP IT! Don't shrug and say
those words you know will only hurt.
You love it don't you, you sick bastard? You like cutting with those sharp
words of yours. Does it make you feel big and important? You do it because
you can, isn't that right? She opened her heart to you and you trampled it
like dirt. You dragged her through hell and back, and for what? To see how
far this declaration of love would go?
You led her on. Maybe she would have been better off not knowing you. Did
she really think you could change? Years of habit compiled and compressed
into sturdy barricades against the world are not to be broken in a single
day. So you saved her life, and kissed her under the moonlight when all was
said and done. The fairytale couple, suffering like so many other couples
do.
How much more fun do you think romances would be when you see them taking
place inside marriage counseling, or a divorce court?
Monster. Sad, fucking monster.
That's all I am, isn't it? That's the real me I see in your eyes. Yes, that
callous, cruel person who takes you for granted and doesn't know how good
they have it until it's gone.
How much longer will you stay by me? Friends say, not long at this rate.
They say, if I keep this up, I'll lose the only person who ever loved me.
And even as they say that, I can feel that blankness on my face, and crazy
laughter bubbling at the back of my throat like some horrific acid eating
its way out of my heart.
You make me want to hit you. I want to stop those words coming from your
lips.
It's okay, I understand. I love you for who you are. I love all of
you.
All of me? Even the faults? How can you love me when I don't love myself?
I don't deserve your love. I don't want your love. I want...I don't know
what I want. I want something, probably out of my reach and unrealistic.
I want to stop feeling guilty. Am I dragging this out? Should I just leave?
Do you want to leave? Stop looking at me that way! This is hard enough
as it is.
I don't want to lose you. As much as I hurt you, you hurt me too with every
sweet word you say. Each term of affection feels like just another bullet
piercing my body. Is this what love is? To hurt and hurt and never have it
feel good? Is love where you have to feel dependent on another person for
your happiness?
They say I should make compromises. They say, I shouldn't allow my personal
wishes to interfere with the relationship. But I was raised to believe that
if I wanted something and worked hard for it, I could have it no matter what.
You were handed everything you could ever want by a doting father, something
I can't even begging to relate to. You never had to fight to know who you
were. The daughter of an influential man shouldn't have such worries. But
an orphan with no past and a bleak, probably short, future struggles daily
to define himself. That's the way of the fighter. My way...or the
highway.
But then again, I trust you. Someone help me. Part of my walls have weakened.
Somehow you've wedged your foot in the door and part of you is inside. You're
an intruder in my home, in my life, in my heart and soul and mind. I don't
want you in there. I don't know how to love. I can't be what you want me
to be. Don't you see that?
But you don't care. You love me. How in Hyne's name can you fucking love
me?!
You don't know anything about me! You don't know what it is that makes me
tick. Get out, get out of my life! It's always been me, only me. I've never
had to worry about someone's life cluttering my own. I've never had to worry
about how my actions might offend others. After all, they're just people
I know. They aren't close to me. They can be replaced. There are a hundred
billion people in this world. Why do you get special
privileges?
Why me? What do you see in me? I don't know you well enough to say what it
is I see in you. I could say I like your smile, or the way you tilt your
head when you're curious or being a flirt. I could say that your laugh makes
my chest feel warm, as if a giant heater were burning inside my ribcage.
I could say a dozen more corny lines to you.
Pride keeps my mouth shut. Or fear. It's hard to tell between the two,
sometimes.
Maybe I am aloof. I always told people I am cold and unlovable. They say
it's my fault. They say that I am the one to blame. I should be able to open
up to others if I really wanted to. But it's so hard. It's like stretching
a muscle that has been cramped for a long time. It's agony the first few
times you do it, and then it gradually gets better. But now and then, I get
phantom pains and just want to curl up in a ball and hide. This folding and
unfolding of myself is what's thickening those walls I've put up.
I need patience and understanding. It may take me a long time to ever fully
grasp the gist of all of this. It may be years. Maybe a whole lifetime. I
hope I don't find myself alone at the end. I don't want to be alone. One
is such a lonely number.
You hug me now, your head on my shoulder, sighing into my neck in just the
right way to give me chills. Desire, apprehension...Will I ever get used
to bringing you so close? You tighten your arms around my shoulders and I
push you the slightest bit away. You sigh, and I hold mine in check. I always
hold back.
I always hold back.
~The End~