˗ˏˋ 🍂 'ˎ˗ 𝐈𝐍 𝐖𝐇𝐈𝐂𝐇 ─── Bella and Evelyn have been dating for over eight months, living in a cozy apartment in the middle of London. With a job like theirs, Bella is often away, giving Evelyn a lot of time to kill. When Bella is offered a l...
For some odd reason, me and Bella have never said the three big words to each other. We are both fully aware of where our relationship is and we both know we're in love with one another, but for some strange reason we're both just too much of a coward to say it out loud. I have wondered about this fact for hours, sometimes even while we were together and I was laying in Bella's arms. I have always had commitment issues due to my mother's early passing. For months and months I called her selfish for killing herself, because it wasn't fair to us. Obviously it wasn't fair to us, but now I'm old and mature enough to realise there really wasn't another way out for my mum in her eyes. She really believed that suicide was the only option, which makes me even more sad. Being able to blame someone, to blame her, somehow helped a lot. I found myself angry at everything and everyone right after she passed, but when I started blaming people I found out how to manage that particular part of my grieving process more. It's not like I have never wanted to say the three words to Bella, but I just keep worrying about the fact that they might not say it back, and that frightens me. A part of me knows Bella loves me, and to be honest, sometimes that's just as fulfulling, but other days I find myself insecure about everything we have built up in the past months, just because the three words remain unspoken.
With Alora the words just fell naturally, at the end of one of our 'hangouts'. Since then, we have said it to each other every time we say goodbye. Bella has witnessed this a few times, but has never mentioned it afterwards. Instead, they just go do the dishes in a faster pace than normal, which at first seemed like a coincidence, but then it started adding up. I didn't even notice it the first time I said 'I love you' aloud to Alora in front of Bella, but they definitely did. A part of me doesn't understand why that didn't just trigger them to say the words to me. We have been together for months, and have even moved in together, but somehow neither of us feel comfortable enough to say it. Maybe comfortable is the wrong word, since Bella is the person I feel at my best with, and I know I'm the same to them, it's just not that easy for some reason.
One time, I thought they were going to tell me how much I meant to them, but instead they stammered and fully stopped talking. It was a Sunday night, our night, and the sky was just starting to get darker. We were on our way back home from a movie we had watched at our local cinema, and the moment was there. The traffic was starting to pile up, causing us to stand still. Bella had their hand on my knee, and I had my own hand over theirs. "Tonight was amazing." A smile spread across their face as they continued to rub my knee. "Yeah, it really was." I replied, now also with a grin on my face. My cheeks had started to get red, even though we had already been dating for months and months at that point. Bella opened their mouth again, looking like they were about to say something important. "Ev, I-" They were still smiling, but out of concern mine had slightly faded, not wanting to take anything away from whatever they were about to tell me. I couldn't help but fear for the worst. Bella took a big sigh, causing me to get even more worried than before. They stared into my eyes for several seconds, and it seemed as if they were looking for something, an emotion. "Nevermind." Bella's soft voice filled the car, and I let out a huge sigh of relief, because if it wasn't important enough to tell me, how serious could it be? It wasn't until Bella fell asleep in bed that night when I realised what they were about to say to me. I remember the rage at myself just fully taking over my mood for the next two days, being cold to almost everyone, but I was still trying to pretend around Bella, so they wouldn't think I knew, about anything for that matter. To this day I still have a small piece of hatred towards myself for that moment. The perfect moment that I had somehow ruined. After that, bringing the subject up just felt awkward, and both of us knew that.
