Just like a bolt of sudden lightning that initially retracts its light first after the rumbling thunder. Love before the loathe—happiness before regret. Like in any other romantic flicks we watched, romance fiction we read, and love songs we heard that made us believe love is magical with butterflies and flowers but never the struggle with swords and daggers.
And falling is one thing. Falling into oblivion to the person you merely met from social media is unexpected for me because this was all new to me—the infatuation, admiration, and addiction all in one. What if I told her that I love her? Would it change some things? The thought of, "A social media love won't bother me at all," and to hell, it wasn't all that. To hell with it.
In 2019, I became a person I never expected to become for the person I am fighting for. We fell, we met, we kissed, and we felt things but it was all temporary. Temporary happiness to an eternal feeling. Never knew lies could stab your beating heart like a piercing dagger. Never knew it was all for show. Never knew I was an option, a side chick, and worst, the other woman. I was called by a lot of things that year and never expected I would be called a "whore" by a person I barely met.
"A whore for her then I am obliged to earn it."
I became the talk of a certain school in a neighboring barangay. One day famous. Who wouldn't be? I then love it to be like that and what would a person like me could do to it? Why not tolerate it while I still have a chance? I took the risk and fought then I won. I won. At last.
"All the things I did just so I could call you mine, all the things you did, oh I hope I was your favorite crime." My favorite crime.
The tables have turned. Hope turns into despair. Butterflies turn into daggers. This hit me, romantic flicks don't always end in a happily ever after. Romance fiction doesn't always end in a happy ending. Love songs never always end with kilig notes. The make-believe becomes a myth to me.
She was perfectly wrong for me. A phase that turns out to be a visible bruise of regrets. A lowkey relationship that came from a cheating prospect has never been a great introduction to my personality. It never will be. Loving the same sex is a bad move for a homophobic family. I loved her in the dark. I hid her in the shadows. It was hard but that doesn't change the fact that the flaming love keeps burning inside me. She was my trigger match. My low blow. My zing. My Athlete.
But she lied.
