It Started With Slow Hands

Slow Hands

"Cause I want you baby,

Yeah, I want you, baby"

- Niall Horan

~~~

     All relationships abide by one rule.

     When they end - and they always will - someone will always get hurt. It makes no distinction between the grieving widow, the cheated on girlfriend or the disillusioned teen. It hurts them all the same.

     Our story ends, and mine begins on an idyllic summer, about a few months back. When I had the distinct pleasure of walking in on my girlfriend ferociously wrapped in both the arms and the lips of Jack Daniel. Nope, not the whiskey, the 18-year old bugger in our Math class.

     As I pulled away from her home - memories of what we had were waiting everywhere. It struck me from the swing set where we shared our first kiss. It hunted me from sand pit where we laid and stared up at the stars, watching as they twinkled so slowly. The most painful one of all was the one pounced upon me from my rear view mirror; where I first held her hand, where I asked her to be mine, where I walked her to after our first prom; where she now stood, with his arms around her waist, silhouetted by the bright light from her living room.

     Our relationship followed the same arc all broken relationships follow. There's the arc of "I'm so sorry" and "it was a mistake" that slowly devolved into "You invaded my privacy" or "You were never meant to see that" to the serene calm of "we should see other people".

     For me, it continued to another phase. The "it was my fault" phase. The nights spent replaying every single possibility in my mind, the could have been and the should have been, the signs I missed because I was blind, ignorant, or both. Until it slowly dawned to me. As much as I hate to admit it, it wasn't my fault.

~~~

     It was hers. It was her choice to cheat. It was her volition to cozy up to Jack, and for her to return his advances. It was her decision to have his hands on her and hers on his. She elected to betray the trust I had in her.