Charlie has been burned one too many times. His love life came to a standstill after his last lover turned out to be deep in debt, planning to use him as a guarantor for yet another loan. Losing any hope he would find his one and only, he immerses h...
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
The nightmares always came back. Not every night, but often enough that it made my life miserable. Every time I woke up after one, my day was ruined. And it wasn't only because of my mood, which turned sour and remained like that throughout the day until it marinated enough to turn bitter and nasty, but because something terrible always happened the very same day.
I kept convincing myself it was all just a coincidence or a terrible manifestation due to my mind racing in circles, visiting all kinds of ugly parts in my stupid brain. But one tiny segment of my consciousness was constantly playing with the idea that it was a curse. I just couldn't accept that so many coincidences could ever exist together, repeating themselves over and over again. And considering my disastrous love life on top of everything else, a curse made much more sense than having a simple case of bad luck.
Red flag after red flag that led to disappointment, resentment, and a conviction I was better off without a partner. If this wasn't a generational curse, then I had no idea what was.
I woke up feeling sick, my heart still racing long after all the disgusting images of the nightmare disappeared from before my eyes.
Even after almost seven years, I was still haunted by the night Oliver woke me up from my stupidly naïve idea that I had a loving boyfriend. I could still see his face. Hear his angry voice and his heart-wrenching sobs once reality finally hit him in full force.
Back then, I wanted to join him in the crying party, but all I was capable of at that moment were a few silent sobs before my eyes dried out, and I ended up staring at the floor, my mind completely blank.
I had been so shocked by the fact I was the other man in the relationship that it took me three days to finally realize what really happened.
Finding out the truth should have been more surprising, but once I fully understood what was going on, I could see the evidence all around me. Inside the flat, in Victor's behavior. I couldn't believe I actually believed his every word. Especially when the flat was full of Oliver's things and their photos together. I wished for the ground to swallow me up whenever I remembered that I believed Victor's ex left all the things behind because he was psychotic and refused to properly move out.
Who in their right mind would believe such a blatant lie?
Me, apparently.
I'd like to blame it all on my naivety as Victor was my first serious relationship, but even a naïve child would notice there was something wrong and sketchy with the whole story.
I was simply stupid.
Love was certainly blind, as they said. But in my case, it wasn't only my blindness that skewed my judgment. My brain most likely rotted away on top of that. There was no better explanation for my firm belief in every word Victor told me.
There was one positive thing that came out of all that suffering and humiliation, though. My friendship with Ollie. We both managed to focus our bitterness and hatred on Victor, and it helped us overcome our dislike for each other.
