Stories of Love

Mortality

At some point love can die.

She believed so, she thought so.

Because sadly it was her father and her mother.

They were in love, she believed so. At some point to a stage where they decided to bring her to be part of their lives. Yes, she thought so.

It was a house full of warmth, radiating from every spot that she set her foot on. Sending a different feel swirming to her guts as she watched their intimate compassion reflected from the way things placed at every spot around the house.

Witnessing with her own two eyes made her believed that love really did exist.

But they didn't necessarily always last.

That she thought so.

She knew she was just an outsider, a stranger welcomed into their lives, to become a part share of their home palace. A new life to be expected to be their new source of love.

Except she wasn't. Not the way they expected. That she was so sure she believed so.

Because apparently she was part of a love that died long time ago. Even before she existed.

She never knew her true mother nor who her true father was. She thought she didn't really want to know, because she had her family in the orphanage. The institution was also part of her world that she kept close to her heart. And her world got more brighter as they came picking her up from the orphanage to be their 'daughter'. That, she used to believe so.

She thought she finally found her home. A place where she could belong to. And they convinced her so too, to the point that she started to believe so.

Her father was the one who approarched her first when they visited the orphanage, setting his eyes solemnly only into her presence rather than looking around for another cute little girls or boys that really were waiting to be picked up. She thought, "Is that what destiny is? Is that why they connect to her instantly?"

She always believed that there were no coincidences, so so. Life worked in its own mysterious way.

Which was what led her to a thought that that certain mysterious way was the one which brought her to her doomed.

She just never thought that a simple birth certificate could bring their love crashing down. Separated to pieces just like that. In the mix of shouting and ignorance against one another, so reeked of tension that was too dense to even be looked through.

She was the true heir of her father as stated in a birth certificate that was hidden from her adoptive mother for ages that even she didn't even know and believe of. She was the lone heir from the wrong mother. A bastard child to their marriage life.

She regretted that she was the cause of her mother going on rampant, filled with rage throwing divorce papers forcefully to her father with a look of sudden hatred thrown to her. But what could she do? That was what she believed so.

Wasn't she worth of love? She thought she didn't because she brought their love to an end. She believed that in return her love wouldn't last longer than that. Because that's just how karma worked.

That she believed so, she thought so.

So she certainly didn't worth of his love. If, what between them could even be called love.

But she couldn't help hoping her love could stay the way it was. Unchanged, strong as ever, selfless as ever.

She didn't care if it was unrequited.

She would cherish what she had.

Because she was afraid the love would come to a point of dying down if she loosened herself once.

So she would always keep this love inside her heart.

As she thought so. As she believed so.

........

She eyed the ring still placed on her ring finger, pressed between her middle and her pinkie. It had been years. She thought as she kept playing with it.

Ten years they had been married and the house was still as quiet as when they first moved here. And her pick of a lone house with big yards in the outskirt of town certainly didn't help mending the loneliness she felt inside when he was out.

She had been sitting alone outside to think. Her husband usually came back after four, so she thought she'd be waiting outside to greet him.

"What are you thinking?"

She was too deep in thought that she didn't realize her husband had been standing there in front of the verandah, but refusing to come in. His bag was still hooked to his hand, his car parked not far behind him.

She had been looking at him in surprise that she forgot to answer.

"Nothing," she replied curtly, refusing to explain anything.

"Don't space out too much." He said with a sigh. "You know I don't like you being vulnerable like this."

"What if I am?" She suddenly wondered.

"Then that would be inconvenience," he looked her with a smile, finally taking a few steps closer to her, "Because you're not."

She gave him a snort and a disbelieving look.

"Don't give me that look."

He was standing right in front of her now, looking down to her, looking her to the core, deepest of the deepest inside. He bent down and kissed her softly, asking for exchange for her forgotten greeting.

But then his gaze became hard as he sensed her doubt, and she was once again feeling weak being stormed down by its intensity. 
"You're the one being all strong and stupid, allowing me to marry another women."

"I couldn't bear a child."

"Yeah." That was true. "But I couldn't bear being unfaithful."

"That's different," she cut him.

His hand was suddenly gripping her arm, "How was it different?"

She looked away, even when he nagged at her to look back at him. She didn't want to talk of it. She hated how unable she was to just give him what he needed. They were arranged to be married for him to simply have an heir, but then she just had to found out that she was bare after. She sometimes asked why he even bothered to marry her.

"We could adopt a child," she tried saying after the silence felt too much. Her new tears was even starting to form.

"And what? Force you to remember all that nasty past you have?" He nearly screamed at her that she unconciously cringed, making him let go of her hand. She watched with regret as he frustratedly scratched at his head, messing his hair.

He continued with the same irritation, "Took me years to convince you to tell me. I'm not gonna ruin that by making you living it again."

She was stunned.

"I didn't know you care."

"How can I not?" He said, even more frustrated. "You're my wife."

"By law."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

He felt insulted, but she couldn't blame him. They had been together for long to know that it was still true. And she was the one who spoke it up, so she was to blame.

But even when knowing, she couldn't help to ask to be sure,

"Do you love me?"

Even after years, it still took him some times to think of the right answer.

And in the end he never answered.

She thought so. She had this prepared. Afterall, this was all arranged.

She smiled at him, all the while making the face 'I told you so' to conceal her hurt. Hoping he didn't see it. Because it would be hard for her, what with also knowing that he didn't love her.

But she would love him. In silence. In her caress for him. In her yearn for him to feel the same about her. Maybe sometimes.

She believed so.